Dr. Vilas A Tonapi has been appointed Director of Indian Institute of Millets Research (IIMR), Rajendranagar. He is presently the Principal Scientist at Seed Science and Technology of the IIMR.

Dr. Tonapi earlier served as Head, Division of Seed Science and Technology, IARI, New Delhi. He holds a Ph.D from Tamil Nadu Agriculture University and did his post Doctoral from University of Queensland, Australia. His special attainments include Planning, development and management of crop improvement programmes and strategies. He has 50 research papers to his credit in peer reviewed journals, 30 authored and edited books.

IIMR

• Indian Institute of Millets Research (IIMR) upgraded from Directorate of Sorghum Research (DSR), is the central agency to work on all aspects of millets research and development under the auspeces of Indian Council of Agricultural Research (ICAR).
• While the main centre at Hyderabad campus is principally engaged in both basic and strategic research on millets, region-specific research and services are organized through two other centres – Solapur in Maharashtra and OSN, Warangal in Telangana.
• It was earlier a multi-crop centre, and its pioneering work in hybrid and varietal development has created indelible impact with its contributions in developing superior varieties of groundnut, red-gram and castor in addition to sorghum hybrids and varieties.