Tag Archives: #BanGMMustard

CHENNAI: The State government has already taken a policy decision not to allow any GM crops. The commercial release of the GM mustard in Tamil Nadu is out of the question. However, that should not make the official machinery complacent; instead the authorities should tighten the measures to prevent its entry into the State and also promote measures to grow native varieties of mustard, said organic farming activists.

As chief minister of Gujarat, Narendra Modi may have extolled the virtues of genetically modified (GM) crops, after his happy experience in the state, but as prime minister, he is finding it extremely tough to carry along even his party on the issue. Encouraged, and perhaps egged on, by the RSS and affiliate Swadeshi Jagran Manch’s (SJM’s) opposition to GM crops, various BJP-ruled states like Madhya Pradesh and Rajasthan have upped their protest against GM mustard even though the bio-safety panel of the Genetic Engineering Appraisal Committee (GEAC) has approved Dhara Mustard Hybrid-11 developed by the scientists led by former Delhi University vice-chancellor Deepak Pental.

Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS)-affiliated organisations are increasingly lending their voice to those at the other end of the ideological divide on certain issues where there’s a meeting of minds. These include opposition to the government’s move to sell the land of closed public sector undertakings (PSUs) and allow genetically modified (GM) seeds.