In the lush fields of Punjab germinates a scary tale. Farmers there live in a disturbing cesspool of toxicity, as a result of excessive and unregulated use of pesticides and chemical fertilisers
At 9.20pm every day, a passenger train leaves Bhatinda town for Bikaner in Rajasthan. Wrapped in blankets, a number of ailing men and women steadily head towards platform number two at Bhatinda railway station to catch the Abohar-Jodhpur passenger train to Bikaner. Dubbed the ‘Cancer Express’, it routinely ferries a large number of patients from Punjab’s cotton belt for treatment to the Acharya Tulsi Regional Cancer Treatment and Research Centre in Bikaner. The scene is repeated every night, for the past few years. Cancer patients and their families outnumber other passengers boarding the train.
The Abohar-Jodhpur passenger train brings hope for the cancer patients of the Malwa belt comprising the districts of Bhatinda, Muktsar, Mansa, Ferozepur, Moga, Barnala, Faridkot and Sangpur. Farmers and families here are grappling with cancer and health problems that have insidiously crept into their homes through the backdoor, even as the farmers of India’s ‘grain bowl’ fed the nation.
The incidence of cancer and other diseases in the Malwa belt has spiralled in the last decade. It is a common belief that cancer struck the region soon after cotton cultivation was introduced here. The reckless spraying of pesticides to save the cotton crop had its after effects — the underground water and soil has been contaminated to an alarming level. Insecticides like aldrin, heptachlor and endosulfan were detected in blood samples in Talwandi Sabo. Presence of such harmful pesticides was also found in the vegetables grown in the area.
Malwa’s food chain has been severely affected by the excessive use of chemicals in farming — the reason for cancer acquiring alarming proportions in the region.
Punjab was the cradle of the Green Revolution in the 60s and 70s. Apart from high-yielding crop varieties, the ‘revolution’ heavily depended on usage of synthetic fertilisers and pesticides. Reportedly, Punjab consumes more pesticides than any other State in the country. The first such suggestion was made in 2005 when the Centre for Science and Environment reported the presence of pesticides in human blood samples. But, the State’s health department countered the CSE’s report with a parallel study, done in four days, on 450 samples and declared there was no trace of pesticides in them.
A survey by the Bhabha Atomic Research Centre in 2007 found water samples tainted with uranium in Faridkot. Another study by the Post Graduate Institute of Medical Education & Research, Chandigarh, in several villages in Bhatinda found 125 cancer cases per 1,00,000 people. The study also linked the prevalence to the use of pesticides and the presence of nitrates in water.
So, is the villain uranium, nitrates, or pesticidesIJ According to the experts, it is a deadly cocktail of causes.
“The Government has suppressed data and has distorted a scientific study. Every village in the State now has water filters. The Government itself is providing RO devices and filters, confirming the water here is not fit to drink. Despite all this, the State Government refuses to acknowledge the cause of contamination and its connection to cancer”, says Umendra Dutt, executive director of Krishi Virasat Mission. According to the reports, the Chief Minister of Punjab, Mr Parkash Singh Badal, downplayed the correlation, even ruling out promoting organic farming or banning chemical pesticides.
The State, with just 1.5 per cent of the geographical area of the country and 2.5 per cent of the agricultural land, consumes more than 18 per cent of pesticides used in India. In fertilisers too, the State’s consumption is far above the national average. Figures provided by the Fertiliser Association of India reveal that nearly 400kg of synthetic fertiliser is used on every hectare of cultivated land in Punjab, while the national average is 150kg. The high subsidies have promoted non-judicious use, adversely affecting the soil.
Punjab practices intensive agriculture that needs pesticides. Industry says that, compared to the developed world, we use fewer pesticides in India. That might be true. But what industry does not tell us is that we find much more pesticide, compared to the developed world, in our food, our water, our soil. And now in our blood!
Those detected with cancer have to contend with not just the physical discomfort but also the financial burden the disease brings. Yet, the farmers find it hard to give up the use of pesticides. Ignorance towards adopting organic farming methods and abject poverty forces them to live in the cradle of carcinogenic pesticides. It is a deadly choice between the risk of having a poor crop or contracting cancer.
While problems for Punjab farmers have been mounting manifold, be it suicides or cancer, the response of the State Government has been abysmal. The State is sitting on a volcano of environmental health crisis, which is affecting not only human beings but all other living species.
KVM has accused the Punjab Government of lying to the National Human Rights Commission. “The State’s health department told NHRC that it has banned pesticides causing cancer. But, no such ban exists”, said Mr Dutt. Taking suo motu cognisance of media reports about high prevalence of cancer in Malwa region, the NHRC had issued a notice to the Punjab chief secretary last year. On February 27, this year, the principal secretary (health), in his report to the NHRC, accepted that the consumption of pesticides was high in Malwa. He said farmers were being trained on judicious use even as some dangerous pesticides have been banned. But many pesticides suppliers do not know of the ban.
So, is there a way outIJ The prevalence of diseases is the first real jolt to consider a different way of growing healthy crops. Some are adopting organic methods but that is a rarity. Non-pesticide management has revolutionised pest management in Indian agriculture. Mainly done through bio-pesticides and mechanical pest management techniques, which is a mix of traditional knowledge and modern scientific wisdom, it refrains from use of pesticides or genetically modified organisms to control farm pests. Andhra Pradesh is the flag-bearer of NPM. The idea has caught on in other parts of the country, so why not in PunjabIJ
While the Punjab Government is still trying to reach a conclusion on the link between pesticides and cancer, in 2009, a German laboratory tested hair samples of autistic children in Bhatinda and found uranium, a carcinogen, in them. A team from the Bhabha Atomic Research Centre carried out further tests and found that of the nine water samples from Faridkot and Amritsar, three exceeded the Atomic Energy Regulatory Board’s limit for uranium in drinking water of 60 microgram per litre.
Union Minister for Rural Development Jairam Ramesh has also confirmed the presence substantial quantities of uranium, arsenic, mercury and other heavy metals in the groundwater in the State, particularly in the Malwa region.
“The level of uranium in the groundwater is 50 per cent over the WHO norms. The source of this is not yet known. Punjab is the only State to have uranium in its water”, Mr Ramesh said recently.
The effect of all this can be seen in the growing number of patients in the Malwa belt with cancer and other diseases and children being born with abnormalities.
“Not just cancer, there are scary reports of reproductive health crisis, from spontaneous abortions to premature deliveries, reduced sperm counts and neural canal birth defects in infants”, says noted farmers’ rights activist Kavitha Kuruganti.
Surveys have revealed that women are more vulnerable to cancer and among cancers, uterine and breast cancer are the most prevalent.
However, there is a silver lining. Women of Chaina village in Faridkot have taken an initiative to grow organic vegetables without using pesticides or chemical fertilisers.
Given the adverse impacts of chemical pesticides, and evidence to show that pesticides are not needed in farming, a new campaign has been launched nationwide, called ‘India For Safe Food’ — a movement seeking to change perception amongst farmers, consumers and Governments in their approach to farming technologies and food consumption.
