Skip to main content

Pesticides endorsed? Business Standard ad on foreign funded NGOs malicious: Activists

In a sharp rebuttal to a full-page advertorial published in the daily “Business Standard” (July 29), more than 160 academics, activists and NGOs, many of them working in the environmental field, have said that the content the advertorial by the all-India pesticides and chemical fertilizer industry body, Crop Care Federation of India (CCFI), is “malafide as it seeks to promote harmful agricultural practices detrimental to public interest.”
Written by Nirmala Pathrawal, executive director, CCFI, the advertorial seeks to attack “foreign funded environmental NGOs” for refusing to talk about “the sunny side of Indian agriculture”, adding, “Over the years, they have so aggressively articulated scary stories and negative narratives about Indian agriculture in the public domain that it has got focused firmly in the minds of the people.”
Calling the NGO allegation that Indian farmers use excessive agrochemicals “disinformation campaign”, the advertorial says, “Their agenda is to adversely affect the export competitiveness of Indian agricultural commodities by scare mongering.”
Among the scholars and activists, the advertorial sharply accuses well-known environmentalist Sunita Narain of the Centre for Science and Environment (CSE), based in New Delhi, for receiving Rs 265 crore foreign funds over the last five years in order to keep saying that “cancer in Punjab remain high on account of intensive agriculture and use of pesticides”, which is "utterly baseless and totally false."
It also attacks ex-Greenpeace activist Kavitha Kuruganti – currently associated with a volunteer-driven informal network committed to Indian farmers’ rights, Alliance for Sustainable & Holistic Agriculture (ASHA) -- for having “unrestricted access” to “confidential documents”, suggesting the type of access and influence these NGOs have in the administration.
The advertorial criticizes “organic farming” which till about 50 years ago had led to “short supplies of foods” leading “starvation deaths” around the world, including India, insisting, “The Irish Potato Farming and the Great Chinese Famine were caused due to pest/disease outbreak and lack of agri inputs, mainly pesticides.”
The advertorial cites how in 1959 China attempted to introduce countrywide organic farming, but finding that it was a “disaster”, it abandoned it, claiming, “Today, China accounts for nearly 30% of world's agricultural production” and is also “the largest consumer of pesticides and fertilisers.”
It underlines, “Organic farming can at best be a small and niche market segment. The claim of the foreign funded environmental activist NGOs that our soil, environment and water have become degraded, polluted and unproductive due to excess use of chemical inputs are all wrong.”
The rebuttal to the advertorial by 160 plus activists, scholars and NGOs follows a strongly-worded critique the advertorial by Kavitha Kuruganti, who in a blog addressed to the "Business Standard" editor, says, “CCFI might as well have accused the Prime Minister of India of scare-mongering then, when from the ramparts of the Red Fort on India’s Independence Day in 2019, he gave a clarion call to farmers to reduce and phase out agro-chemicals and save Mother Earth.”
Kavitha Kuruganti, Sunita Narain
In their statement, activists, scholars and NGOs criticize “Business Standard”, stating the daily is liable for the advertorial’s “irresponsible content”, underlining, “The publication is not only violative of journalistic ethics and guidelines of the Press Council of India but also of its own code of conduct. It is not enough to offer as an excuse that the advertorial published was not its original content.”

“The modality of publication of this content is even more dangerous if it does not offer the opportunity to refute these allegations”, the statement insists. 
Calling the content of the advertorial "malafide", the statement says, "it seeks to promote harmful agricultural practices detrimental to public interest." Stating that CCFI has dubious credentials, as it is an industry body of chemical manufacturing companies, it adds, CCFI serves "corporate agenda and profit making interests at the cost of health risks to the public."
Pointing out that the advertorial makes "a targeted attack against reputed activists, scholars, scientists as well research institutions", the statement claims, "The NGO sector plays a very important role of supplementing government efforts towards the well-being of people", adding, "The advertorial maliciously imputes ulterior motives to foreign funded institutions by suggesting that their work is detrimental to the interests of the nation." 
The statement demands:
  • Business Standard should retract the advertorial from all its online editions with immediate effect.
  • CCFI and "Business Standard" must publish an unconditional apology for this malicious advertorial. This apology should be published on prominently front page of the print edition and on all online editions of Business Standard. 
  • Press Council of India and other regulatory bodies should take strict action as per their norms and guidelines. 
---
Click here for the list of those who have endorsed the statement

Comments

TRENDING

World Hijab Day? Ex-Muslim women observe Feb 1 as No Hijab Day, insist: 'Put it on a Man'

I didn't know that there could ever be a thing as World Hijab Day until I received an email alert from Maryam Namazie of the Council of Ex-Muslims of Britain (CEMB), stating that several ex-Muslim women's groups had observed the same day—February 1—as No Hijab Day! According to Namazie, the day "was created on February 1 as a direct response to World Hijab Day" to "illuminate the coercive and oppressive realities of the hijab as a pillar of sex apartheid and a war on women."

Google powered AI refuses to correct grammar of a 'balanced' piece on Trump sending chained immigrants to India!

This is a continuation of my blog on how, while the start-up-developed AI app DeepSeek is being criticized for consistently rejecting content related to China or Maoism, there appears to be no mention in Western media about why another app, developed by the powerful Google, Gemini, remains silent on Indian political issues.  

Gujarat a police state? How top High Court advocate stunned a senior-most journalist

Rajdeep Sardesai, Anand Yagnik This is a continuation of my earlier blog on well-known journalist Rajdeep Sardesai's lecture in memory of the late Achyut Yagnik at the Ahmedabad Management Association (AMA). I was a little surprised when I received the intimation about the venue for the lecture.

5% poor in India? Union govt claim debunked, '26.4% of population below poverty line'

A recent paper, referring to the Household Consumption Expenditure Survey (HCES) 2022-23 of the Government of India (GoI), has debunked the official claim that poverty has substantially declined. Titled "Poverty in India: The Rangarajan Method and the 2022–23 Household Consumption Expenditure Survey", the paper —authored by scholars CA Sethu, LT Abhinav Surya, and CA Ruthu—states that "more than a quarter of India’s population falls below the poverty line."

Why predictions of an imminent collapse of the Russian economy may be wrong

A veteran Canadian journalist, settled in Russia, stated in a Facebook post that President Donald Trump "is apparently listening to experts who tell him that Russia's economy is on the verge of 'imploding,' and if he just squeezes a bit harder," his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin "will fall into line."

Talking of increased corporate control over news, Rajdeep Sardesai 'evades' alternative media

When I received an intimation that well-known journalist Rajdeep Sardesai was to speak at the Ahmedabad Management Association (AMA) on February 2, my instant reaction was: I know what he is going to say—his views are quite well known; he wouldn’t be saying anything new. Yet, I decided to go and listen to him to catch his mood at a time when the media, as he (and I) knew it, is changing fast due to the availability of new technological tools that were not accessible even a decade ago.

Why burn Manusmriti? Why not preserve it to demonstrate, display historicity of casteism?

In a significant Facebook post, Rana Singh, former associate professor of English at Patna University, has revealed something that few seem to know. Titled "The Shudras in Manusmriti", Singh says,  because Manusmriti is discussed so often, he thought of reading it himself. “This book likely dates back to the 2nd or 3rd century BCE, and the presence of contradictory statements suggests that it is not the work of a single author,” he says in his Facebook post in Hindi, written in 2022 and recently reshared.

I'm flattered: A New York media house claims I was a KGB agent! Wow, I didn't know that

I was astonished, let me say pleasantly surprised, on receiving a comment by Rich TVX News  on my blog   "Why predictions of an imminent collapse of the Russian economy may be wrong" (January 28).  I don't know who wrote the strange comment from this "media house", which is based in New York, and claims to "hold sway not only among the masses but also within global corridors of power, influencing esteemed politicians and shaping international diplomacy, especially evident during pivotal events like the ongoing crisis in Ukraine."

Gujarat's water anarchy? 16.7% of Narmada water going to industry, 33% of targeted area irrigated: Govt insider

The Narmada project is something that has always excited me, including how much water will be distributed and to which sector. A few days ago, when I was talking to a top Gujarat government insider, I was a little surprised when I was told that it is up to the “respective states to decide how much Narmada water they would distribute among various sectors” out of the total quota allocated to the four states—Madhya Pradesh, Gujarat, Maharashtra, and Rajasthan—as per the Narmada Water Disputes Tribunal award of 1979.