Dr. Manikrao Madhavrao Salunkhe is Vice Chancellor, Bharati Vidyapeeth Deemed University, Pune. He obtained his doctoral degree in Organic Chemistry in 1979 from Shivaji University, Kolhapur, India.

Dr. Salunkhe’s research interests include areas such as polymeric reagents, oligonucleotides and ionic liquids, in which he has made important contributions.

He was appointed Professor of Organic Chemistry in 1995 at the prestigious Institute of Science (former Royal Institute of Science, Bombay) in Mumbai, where he later became Head, Department of Chemistry (1997) and then Director (2000-2004). Under his dynamic and visionary leadership, the Institute established itself as one of the highly acclaimed centres in India for advanced studies and research in science.

Throughout his illustrious career in the Education sector, Dr Salunkhe held the positions of Vice-Chancellor of Shivaji University, Kolhapur, First Vice-Chancellor of the Central University of Rajasthan, Vice-Chancellor of Yashwantrao Chavan Maharashtra Open University, Nashik, and also Vice-Chancellor of Symbiosis University of Applied Sciences, Indore.

Dr. Salunkhe has more than 150 research publications plus one patent to his credit, most of them being in international journals of high impact factors.

His academic distinctions include honours such as the Fellow of Royal Society of Chemistry, UK, Member of American Chemical Society, Fellow/Member of Indian Chemical Society, Maharashtra Academy of Science, Bio-organic Society of India, International Society for Nucleosides, Nucleotides and Nucleic Acids. For his meritorious contributions, he has received Best Teacher Award of the Government of Maharashtra, among others.