Harsh Vardhan Batra is an Indian scientist working in animal biotechnology at the Department of Biotechnology (DBT), of the Indian Ministry of Science and Technology. He is a former director of the Defence Food Research Laboratory (DFRL), a Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO) establishment at Mysore (April 2012 – Dec 2015). As a specialist in infectious diseases, he participated in the DRDO biodefence preparedness program, and was an expert member of the technical advisory committee on plague constituted by the government of India in September 1994. He served as technical consultant for the design and construction of high containment laboratories for DRDO, the Indian Council for Agricultural Research (ICAR) and Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR). He participated in the United Nations Biological Weapons Convention (BTWC) ad hoc group meetings in Geneva as a member of the Indian delegation, and conducted World Health Organization (WHO) Southeast Asia Regional Office meetings and workshops on infectious diseases.
