Seven years after the commercial launch of Monsanto’s Bt cotton, Indian farmers are about to plant the first publicly bred genetically modified (GM) seeds of the crop. The current kharif season will see around 10,000 acres being sown under Bikaneri Nerma-Bt, an in-bred variety, and 2,000 acres under a hybrid, NHH 44-Bt – both developed by the Indian Council of Agricultural Research’s Central Institute for Cotton Research (CICR).