Desperation seems to have caught up with the normally imperturbable tribal farmers of Adilabad which is evident from the abnormally large number of suicides by them since 2011. As many as 27 of them, all cotton farmers including a woman, from the aboriginal Gond, Naikpod, Mannepu and the Lambada plains tribe, figure in the list of 101 cotton farmers who have committed suicide since January 2011. Giving up life, for whatever reason, was hitherto an unknown phenomenon in the primitive tribal communities which, paradoxically, have deprivation for a way of life. The gamut of Bt cotton, however, has dislocated their way of dealing with failures and like the trend in other communities, tribals are increasingly preferring the 'easy way' out.

The government has, in fact, been cracking down on firms supplying sub-standard seeds and has been taking action against Mahyco Monsanto Biotech, which sub-licences the use of Bollgard I and II technologies to 28 Indian firms. The state agriculture department recently served a show-cause notice on Mahyco, asking why it should not be banned from supplying and distributing cotton seeds, as it was providing wrong information to the government. It led to speculation that the DF government began the process to ban Bt cotton. ”There has been a question mark on the use of Bt cotton in Maharashtra for long. I have directed a comprehensive review of Bt cotton. Experts will closely examine and critically reassess its use,” agriculture minister Radhakrishna Vikhe-Patil told ToI, adding that farmers will be better off using traditional varieties of cotton seeds.

Bt cotton may have taken almost 99% area under cotton cultivation in Maharashtra but, looking at the diminishing profit margins, the state government is planning to evolve other options to the genetically modified variety of the crop. [...] State agriculture minister Radhakrishan Vikhe-Patil has asked agriculture universities to develop alternatives to Bt cotton to make cotton a more profitable venture for farmers. [...] State agriculture commissioner Umakant Dangat told TOI that since the farmers took up Bt cotton the input costs in the form of fertilizers and pesticides have gone up manifold and it is no longer a sustainable crop, especially in the rain-fed or dry-land areas of the state like Vidarbha and Marathwada. ”Despite cultivation of Bt cotton across the state, the productivity, profitability and sustainability of the crop have gone down.

The Bt-cotton crop in Punjab is under the suspected attack of a new disease. After more than a year of study, Punjab Agricultural University is still unable to tell which enemy is it that turns part of the cotton-plant stem black. The district agriculture department has advised farmers cure for root rots, another disease that starts from roots. The farmers who noticed stems turning black before the plants went dead asked the district agriculture department for help. The samples of the affected plants are under examination at the PAU. It isn't the first investigation of these symptoms. Similar symptoms appeared last year on cotton plants at a village near Abohar. The Central Institute for Cotton Research at Nagpur, Maharashtra, besides the PAU, studied the samples.

Genetically modified cotton or Bt cotton has created large and sustainable benefits, which contribute to positive economic and social development in India. Adoption of Bt cotton technology has caused a 24 per cent increase (126 kg) in cotton yield per acre. This is through reduced pest damage and a 50 per cent gain (Rs 1877 per acre) in cotton profit among smallholders. These benefits are stable, a scientific study by researchers based in Germany has claimed. The adoption of Bt cotton has raised consumption expenditures, a common measure of household living standard, by 18 per cent during the period 2006-2008.

Behind an unmarked door at the side of an anonymous second world war Nissen hut in the middle of Oxfordshire, a group of scientists are attending to the needs of hundreds of thousands of mosquitoes. They provide horse blood for the females to feed on, moist beds for them to lay their eggs, and add genes that transform the mosquitoes into what could be the most decisive tool yet invented to combat mosquito-borne disease. The mosquitoes developed and raised here at the laboratories of Oxitec, a British biotech company based near Didcot, have already infiltrated wild populations in Brazil, Malaysia and the Cayman Islands, and will soon be unleashed in Panama and India.

In the backdrop of widespread speculations that the Democratic Front government has begun the process to ban the Bacillus Thuringiensis cotton, the state clarified that it was only cracking down on firms found involved in malpractices. The government has been able to meet nearly 95 per cent of the total demand of BT cotton seeds in the state, state agriculture minister Radhakrishna Vikhe-Patil informed the Maharashtra Legislative Council on Monday.

Cotton that has been genetically modified to resist bollworms, a devastating cotton pest, continues to stir passions in the Indian subcontinent, with conflicting claims regarding its degree of success. Private firms involved in marketing GM cotton say farmers have reaped substantial profits from the crop. In contrast, several nongovernmental organisations and farmers’ groups continue to denounce GM technology as an overhyped and unsuitable practice that is ruthlessly promoted by multinational firms. Caught between these two viewpoints are those who do not contest the reports of financial profit, but caution against the hidden fallout of this technology, such as the loss of local cotton diversity and farming skills in growing traditional cotton varieties, as well the technology’s limitations in rain-fed areas with few fertiliser inputs.

Yield stagnation in India is primarily because of the vast majority of inappropriate hybrids. [...] Bt cotton is available only as Bt hybrids available in over 1,000 brands, while in the rest of the world Bt cotton is available only as a few straight varieties. [...] Hybrids also tend to be input intensive, so they are not suitable for at least half the area in the country, which is under marginal soils in rain-fed regions. Additionally, many hybrids are susceptible to sap-sucking insects, leaf-curl virus and leaf reddening, adding to input costs. [...] Indiscriminate use of any technology becomes rate-limiting and counter-productive. This was the lesson we refused to learn with the misuse and overuse of synthetic pyrethroids in India between 1980 and 1995, and now we are repeating the mistakes with Bt cotton.

Nobel Laureate James D. Watson, credited for the landmark discovery of the structure of the DNA, says “genetically modified foods are good.” 84-year-old Watson says he feels the use of genetically modified foods was a way to save the world from starvation. Answering a question asked by NDTV at the ongoing Euro Science Open Forum [...] Taking an almost diametrically opposite view, India’s Environment Minister Jayanthi Natarajan told NDTV that “genetically modified foods have no place in ensuring India’s food security.”