Introduction: The presence of epithelial dysplasia is generally accepted as one of the most important predictors of malignant development in pre – malignant lesions. Hence, evaluating the degree of dysplasia is important to envisage their potential for malignant transformation. Thus challenging the available methods of prognosis assessment and encourages the search for new and better molecular markers that relate comprehensively with known alterations of tumour initiation and progression.

Aim: To assess the expression of podoplanin (D2–40) in histopathologically confirmed cases of oral epithelial dysplasia and clinically normal oral mucosa.

Materials and Method: 30 histopathologically confirmed cases of oral epithelial dysplasia and 30 cases of clinically normal oral mucosa were immunohistochemically analysed for expression of podoplanin (D2–40).

Results: High expression of podoplanin was noted in the basal and suprabasal layers of oral epithelial dysplasia whereas the expression in normal oral mucosa was absent. The results of the study were statistically significant on analysis using One – Way ANOVA test in individual groups and Tukey’s post hoc for pairwise comparison.

Conclusion: Correct diagnosis and timely treatment of potentially malignant disorders may help prevent malignant transformation in oral lesions. The present study found statistically significant results in association with podoplanin expression in various grades of oral epithelial dysplasia (OED), thus providing insights into the onset and progression of the diseases.