District Institute of Education and Training, Dharmapuri was established as per the G.O. MS.No. 145, dated 27.06.2007, by the Government of Tamil Nadu and started functioning at Government Higher Secondary School campus at Pulikarai from 03-09-2007 to 27.05.2020. From 28.05.2020 the DIET is functioning in the new own building at Settikarai village of Dharmapuri.
Elementary and adult education systems were already too vast to be adequately supported by National and State level agencies alone like NCERT, NIEPA and SCERTs earlier. Likewise, in the area of adult education, this support was being provided by the Central Directorate of Adult Education at the National level, and by State Resource Centers (SRCs) at the State level. Below the State level, there were elementary teacher education institutions but their activities were confined mostly to pre-service teacher education.
In accordance with the provisions of National Policy on Education (NPE 1986) on teacher education, a centrally sponsored Scheme of Restructuring and Reorganization of Teacher Education was approved in October 1987. One of the five components of the Scheme was establishment of DIETs. Draft guidelines for implementing the DIET component were circulated to States in October 1987 and together with certain subsequent circulars, have formed the basis for its implementation so far. By October 1989, Central assistance had been sanctioned under the Scheme for setting up a total of 216 DIETs in the country.
In Tamil Nadu, there are totally 32 DIETs at present established in 4 phases among which DIET Dharmapuri is established in the fourth phase in the year 2007. It is situated in the Village called as pulikarai, Dharmapuri district. DIET is functioning with seven departments.