SJM warns govt over 'dangerous' GM mustard

Agencies
The Swadeshi Jagran Manch (SJM) on Friday opposed a regulatory body's recommendation for environmental release of genetically
modified mustard, calling it "dangerous" and urged the Centre to ensure that the crop's seed is not allowed to be planted "now or ever".
In a letter to Union Environment Minister Bhupender Yadav, the RSS-affiliated organisation accused the Genetic Engineering
Appraisal Committee (GEAC) of functioning in an "irresponsible fashion" and said the claims made in support of genetically modified
(GM) mustard were "completely untrue, unsubstantiated and wrongly projected".
"Swadeshi Jagran Manch has all along been opposing this dangerous and unneeded GM mustard being brought in through the
backdoor as a public sector genetically modified organism (GMO)," organisation co-convenor Ashwani Mahajan said in the letter.
The ministry had earlier kept the regulatory clearance for the operationalisation of the recommendation made in favour of GM mustard
in abeyance to seek a review after the SJM raised "key issues" of concern.
However, the GEAC "predictably" did not take up any review "worth the name", he added.
"The regulators are joining hands with GM crop developers and are time and again compromising the regulatory regime quite
seriously, and they have done so with this GM mustard also," Mahajan charged.
"We are confident that as a person who has carefully studied the adverse impacts of the GM crops and also published opinion pieces
on the same in the past, you will intervene immediately in this matter, and ensure that no GM mustard seed is allowed to be planted, now
or ever," Mahajan added in his letter to Yadav.
Raising objections to the regulatory body's recommendation, the SJM co-convenor termed as "completely untrue" the claim that GM
mustard was 'swadeshi' and had been developed in India.
"We would like to bring it to your kind notice that in 2002, Proagro Seed Company, which is Bayer's subsidiary, applied for commercial
approval for a similar construct that Prof Pental and his team are now promoting as HT Mustard DMH 11," he said.
Mahajan was referring to scientist Deepak Pental, whose GM mustard technology has been approved by the GEAC.
Bayer's application at that point was turned down because the Indian Council of Agricultural Research (ICAR) said their field trials did
not offer evidence of superior yield, he underlined.
It is "well known" that hybridisation of GM mustard is achieved by means of two genes barnase and barstar, derived from a soil
bacterium called Bacillus amyloliquefaciens, Mahajan said.
The bar-barstar-barnase gene is a patented technology of Bayer Crop Science, he said.
"Bayer is not a Swadeshi company. How can a product patented in their name be termed as Swadeshi.
"The fact that Bayer owns the patent of the genes used in Prof Pental's mustard has been deliberately concealed from the people of
India," he added.
Mahajan said another claim that GM mustard would increase domestic production and reduce India's import dependencies was
"unsubstantiated and wrongly projected".
The GMO mustard has no yield advantage compared to indigenous hybrids, he added.