While political parties have started passing the buck over the sudden deaths of 36 cotton farmers, the mystery around their deaths has raised questions on the nature of GM cotton crops
Toxic pesticide poisoning in Yavatmal district of Maharashtra, leading to the death of 36 farmers and leaving about 1,800 others in the ICU in just one month, is ending up in a political slugfest. The political discourse in India remains warped and that alone explains why the half-awake Opposition, instead of targeting the deeply-entrenched commercial lobbies who mislead the farmers, is trying to derive vote-bank leverage out of this tragedy.
The increasing tendency of the Opposition, in all such tragedies, has been to monetise and commercialise the issue - inevitably stopping only at demanding money and compensation in order to grab attention, rather than target the decade-old deeply institutionalised causes of the problems.
The deaths and affections supposedly arose as a result of farmers inhaling the toxic pesticides while spraying them on genetically modified cotton. The cornered Government, in a haste to show actions performed, booked Krishi Seva Kendras for not selling protective headgear along with the pesticides and targeted a few unlicensed pesticide sellers in Yavatmal. But the deaths have occurred in surrounding areas of cotton belt too in Marathwada and Vidarbha regions and even in Telangana. So, indicting isolated individuals won’t wish away the systemic problem. For either the Government or the Opposition to actually flag the real issues would mean targeting the powerful GM and the pesticide interests.
Besides the obvious ills of toxic pesticides and fertilisers, of more immediate concern are the mysteries surrounding the nature of GM cotton which the present crisis raises. The most popular proffered explanation is that the rising heights, of more than six feet, of the GM cotton crops (because of which farmers have had to perilously spray above their heights, making them susceptible to inhaling the toxic chemicals) and the bad quality of the pesticides used are leading to deaths.
But this raises more issues than it resolves.
First, the GM cotton crops were supposedly considered profitable because of promises of increased productivity and higher profits but now they are demanding more and more doses of pesticides due to their decreased productivity.
Second, as perplexed farmers have themselves pointed out, they have been spraying pesticides above their height for years now — especially in pulses such as ‘Tur’, which are over six feet tall — but so many sudden deaths in one go are uncommon. And they are no novices, having been spraying with their faces uncovered for years now. This puts the spotlight of suspicion back on the nature of the GM cotton crop itself.
Even if we assume that the deaths are only because of poor quality of pesticides — mostly China imported — and because of below-average rainfall leading to humidity or because of flawed spraying pumps ejecting larger doses of pesticides, it still doesn’t explain why only GM cotton cases are leading to the deaths in question.
GM cotton is itself changing. As recent investigations show, it is getting attacked by pests like pink worms and bollworms to which it was supposed to be immune. The crop is also demanding a variety of pesticides to sustain itself, instead of the one or two standard ones that were needed earlier. As its area under cultivation increases dramatically and the harvest period is extended by farmers, the resistance of the crop is failing and a dangerous mix of pesticides is being tried to sustain it.
This has led to a vicious circle, where seductive promises of high yields and pest resistance trapped farmers into a vortex of rising input costs due to expenditure on ineffective fertilisers and pesticides, due to failure of Bt Cotton.
Current diagnoses, hinting towards solutions, can only go so far. It is being suggested that Bt cotton should have been planted in an inter-crop pattern of being interspersed with pulses, jowar etc., instead of monocropping. Such advocacies, in the name of sustainability, still leave the door open for GM crops to have a future, despite their dangers.
They would often end up arguing for the reform of regulations governing pesticides and GM cotton which, though necessary, cannot be ends in themselves and overlook the double-edged nature of the technology itself, despite ample proof. It is a classic case of how the quest for higher productivity and better technology has led to environmental and human devastation. Technology cannot operate in a vacuum and will always be hampered by competing narrow interests. Unless this lesson is realised, dangers galore await us.
(The writer is a researcher at the IPCS and writes for The Resurgent India Trust)