95 Present Address: 1 Principal Scientist and I/C (bhakat56 @gmail.com), 3 Principal Scientist (dkmandal1998@gmail.com), LPM Section. 2 Principal Scientist (anuchatterjee@gamil.com), AN section. 4 Senior Scientist (drmkarunakaran@gmail.com), Physiology section. 5 Principal Scientist (ajoymandal @rediffmail.com), AB section. 6 Scientist (sanchita.bcka @gmail.com), Extension section, NDRI, Karnal. 7 Principal Scientist and Head (tkdcirg@gmail.com). Milk production have not received adequate attention at lower Gangetic region and this has been a major obstacle in dairy development and export potential of milk and milk products. Dairy sector in this region needs urgent improvement in milk production by applying effective management practices. Also, the vital aspect of clean milk production and udder health still remains a major concern in changing scenario. Out of the total milk produced, cow milk represents approximately 83% of total milk production (Srivastava and Khetra 2016). The milk characteristics in terms of milk composition, yield, somatic cell count (SCC) and quality are important factors for dairy farmer, industry and consumer. The intramammary infections (IMI) are serious problems of crossbred dairy animals causing great economic losses due to reduction in milk yield and its value. However, as IMI are usually followed by an influx of leucocytes into milk, an increase in its SCC has been used widely as mastitis indicator (Hanan et al. 2015). SCC is a useful predictor of IMI and, therefore, an important component of milk in assessment aspects of quality, hygiene and mastitis control (Patil et al. 2015). The information on relationship of different milking management practices with IMI, SCC, milk characteristics, hygiene status, cleanliness under farm and field condition at lower Gangetic region are scanty. So, present study was conducted to improve commercial production of clean milk and udder health status in changing dairy scenario. MATERIALS AND METHODS The experiment was carried out in ERS-NDRI, Kalyani farm at lower Gangetic region of WB. Jersey crossbred (J Indian Journal of Animal Sciences 87 (4): 495–500, April 2017/Article Milking management practices and IMI in Jersey crossbred cows in changing scenario CHAMPAK BHAKAT 1 , A CHATTERJEE 2 , D K MANDAL 3 , M KARUNAKARAN 4 , A MANDAL 5 , S GARAI 6 and T K DUTTA 7 ICAR-NDRI, ERS, Kalyani, West Bengal 741 235 India Received: 5 August 2016; Accepted: 19 September 2016 ABSTRACT Experiment was conducted on Jersey crossbred cows (12) to compare 2 management practices viz. hand and machine milking. Field investigations were also carried out on other milking management practices, IMI, hygiene status and cleanliness in 3 stages. A total of 459 milk samples were analysed. Farm experimentation revealed that SCC and MCMT were significantly higher in hand milking as compared to machine milking management. But milk yield and milk extraction rate were significantly lower in hand milking as compared to machine milking management. The time required for milking/animal was significantly higher in hand milking as compared to machine milking management. The morning and evening milk samples of both hand and machine milking showed higher values of SCC, MCMT, pH during evening as compared to morning session but milk yield and milk extraction rate were lower during evening as compared to morning session whereas time required for milking/animal was higher in morning as compared to evening time. Almost similar trend of fat and SNF (%) were estimated in both milking session. Field investigation indicated that SCC, MCMT, pH were higher in IMI animal as compared to no-IMI animal whereas fat and SNF were lower in IMI animal as compared to no IMI animal. Teat dipping and screening of udders for mastitis were never followed by any farmer. Most of farmer having single cow, maintained good hygiene status and cleanliness but most of the farmer having >3 cows, maintained poor hygiene status. Farm experimentation concluded that the IMI can be reduced in machine milking practices in comparison to hand milking practices with higher milk quantity without affecting milk composition in Jersey crossbred cows. Field investigation concluded that there is a significant association between animal keeping pattern and hygiene status/cleanliness at study area. So efforts should be made to increase cleanliness and hygiene status in milking cows itself, housing of animal and milkers of farmer’s house to reduce incidence of IMI in changing scenario. Key words: Cleanliness, Farmer, Hygiene, Hand and machine milking, Milk characteristics