The dehydrogenation of glycerol to lactic acid (LA) under both acceptorless and transfer dehydrogenation conditions using readily available, inexpensive, environmentally benign and earth-abundant base metal salt CoCl2 is reported here. The CoCl2 (0.5 mol%) catalyzed acceptorless dehydrogenation of glycerol at 160 °C in the presence of 0.75 equiv of KOH, gave up to 33% yield of LA in 44% selectivity apart from hydrogen. Alternatively, with acetone as a sacrificial hydrogen acceptor, the CoCl2 (0.5 mol%) catalyzed dehydrogenation of glycerol at 160 °C in the presence of 1.1 equiv of NaOtBu resulted in up to 93% LA with 96% selectivity along with another value-added product isopropanol. Labelling studies revealed a modest secondary KIE of 1.68 which points to the involvement of C-H bond activation as a part of the catalytic cycle but not as a part of the rate-determining step. Catalyst poisoning experiments with PPh3 and CS2 are indicative of the homogeneous nature of the reaction mixture involving molecular species that are likely to be in-situ formed octahedral Co(II) as inferred from EPR, HRMS and Evans magnetic moment studies. The net transfer dehydrogenation activity is attributed to exclusive contribution from the alcoholysis step.