Bt rice has been in the news, first because the Bhartiya Kisan Union,  a farmers’ organisation had set fire to field trial plots in Karnal in Haryana. Subsequently, it was discovered that Bt rice was being tested in field plots in violation of the mandatory rules in several states.  In Orissa, the Organic Farming Association appealed to the farmers and their organisations to be vigilant against the attempts of companies and research institutions to conduct open-air trials of Bt rice in the state, saying that there were no regulatory mechanisms in place for conducting trials for genetically engineered crops in Orissa.

In Chhattisgarh, a region where a large diversity of rice is found in the form of several thousand traditional varieties, the government has ordered an inquiry into a Bt rice trial conducted close to the state capital of Raipur where the Riccharia rice collection  is located. Dr Riccharia had painstakingly collected the rice genetic diversity of the region; the collection is housed at the Raipur University. Chhattisgarh state officials were not informed about the trials, despite clear rules that any agency testing GE crops must inform the concerned authorities at the district and state level as well as the local panchayat.  In addition to the controversial rice trial plots, local activists found a Bt okra test plot next to the Bt rice plot about which farmers had no information either.

Both the trial plots, of rice and okra had already been harvested and nobody knows if and how much of the rice and the okra were sold or consumed. When the concerned company, Mahyco, was contacted their officials suggested that the activists approach the regulatory authorities for details.  State officials complained that they were told about the trial only towards the end of the season and that too only when the Department of Biotechnology asked them to be part of a monitoring team to visit the plot.

In a village in Coimbatore district in Tamil Nadu, people from the Tamil Nadu Farmers Association destroyed the standing rice crop of a farmer because it was a field site for testing Bt rice. The farmer had no idea what he was cultivating, the company had not told him nor had state officials. In Gorakhpur district of Uttar Pradesh, Bt rice trials were being held in violation of rules, the concerned authorities were not informed. The trials were being conducted on a land belonging to an absentee farmer and nobody other than a field assistant was looking after the plot.  The panchayat had not been informed about the trial and the Joint Director of Agriculture had no information about the GE rice trials either. When activists from the Bharatiya Kisan Union reached the plot,  the paddy had already been harvested and there was a lot of grain lying around unattended in the field, contravening the rules for field trials according to which every single grain must be removed carefully , so as not to provide a source of contamination.  The harvested paddy was stored in a room in the village.

The Bt rice, subject of the violations found in all these states, belongs to the company Mahyco. One company, so many violations !  It was as if it was cocking a snook at the regulatory agencies, saying it gave two hoots for the regulatory process. In my view, Mahyco should  lose its license to produce genetically engineered crops. It has still not been made accountable for the failure of its Bt cotton varieties, MECH 12, MECH 162 and MECH 184, which sank without a trace but not before destroying the livelihoods of several thousand farmers. And now, it is fooling around with rice. Because of its tie up with Monsanto and its connections, Mahyco is a player with some clout in the field of GE crops. Its  reckless and irresponsible actions with respect to the Bt rice trials could end up contaminating the rice harvest in this country, with grave consequences for India’s rice exports.

Apart from Mahyco’s transgressions, which must not go unpunished, the fundamental question is whether India should allow the cultivation of GE rice at all. As a centre of origin of rice and a major rice diversity region, it has a special responsibility to safeguard the gene pool of rice for future generations, not just in India but in all parts of the world. In other parts of the world, those regions which are considered to be centres of origin of major crop plants, have a policy of not growing genetically engineered versions of the crops that originated there.  Mexico, the birthplace of corn therefore has a ban on the cultivation of genetically engineered corn; Peru, the centre of origin of potatoes has a ban on the cultivation of genetically engineered potatoes; and similarly China, home of soybean, does not permit the cultivation of GE soybean. India should follow this example of abundant caution and desist from the release of genetically engineered rice until far more research is done to understand how GE rice would impact on the natural gene pool of rice.

 — Suman Sahai