Govt of India told: Toxic technologies being peddled to 'promote' herbicide tolerant rice

Counterview Desk 
More than 400 signatories have endorsed a representation to Shivraj Singh Chauhan, Union Minister for Agriculture & Farmers’ Welfare (photo), stating that herbicide tolerant (HT) rice varieties launched by Indian Agricultural Research Institute (IARI), which comes under the Indian Council of Agricultural Research (ICAR), are a matter of “serious concern”, insisting on “stopping cultivation of these varieties.”
Noting that India is recognised as a Centre of Origin and Diversity for rice, the representation said, HT crops themselves pose a big problem in terms of environmental and health safety, other than socio-economic considerations that arise out of such crops, the representation, authored by three senior activists and experts*, said, ICAR has done something “unlawful as far as the pesticides regulatory regime in India is concerned.”
In fact, it underlined, Imazethapyr, one of the varieties, features in the list of bannable pesticides in a PIL being heard by the Supreme Court of India.

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In June 2024, ICAR launched for commercial cultivation two herbicide-tolerant (HT) basmati rice varieties, tolerant to the direct application of Imazethapyr herbicide to eradicate weeds in the DSR (Directly Seeded Rice) system. DSR itself is promoted on the claim that farmers can grow paddy crop directly in the field without the need for transplanting seedlings from the nursery. It is not out of place to point out that paddy used to be grown through direct seedings in many parts of India once upon a time, before farmers were shifted away from this practice to transplanting.
It is said that these HT varieties were developed through non-GM techniques using a mutated ALS gene (which in turn has been done through a chemical mutant called ethyl methanesulfonate), through a MAS derived HT near-isogenic line of Basmati rice varieties PB1121 renamed as Pusa Basmati 1979, and PB 1509 named as Pusa Basmati 1985. These varieties were initially launched in 2021 and released now for commercial cultivation by farmers.
Imazethapyr is a broad spectrum, post-emergence herbicide. Alongside this, IARI is also recommending pendimethalin for pre-emergence action after 72 hours after sowing and Bispyribac-sodium after 18-20 days. For effective weed management, both kinds of herbicides are being promoted by ICAR scientists with farmers using these HT varieties.
We are familiar with the fact that you have been urging farmers to use non-chemical practices in their agriculture, to save themselves from a variety of negative impacts. Scientists from NARS institutes are also writing articles cautioning about the environmental impacts of these HT varieties on biodiversity and food security. The hype would lead to further monocultures leading to further erosion of varietal diversity as well as crop/general biodiversity. Monocultures by themselves are a threat to our food security.
It is not just public-spirited scientists who can think beyond the short term technical fixes. Farmers’ organisations and civil society groups in the country are worried too about toxic technologies still being peddled by the Indian public sector research system, camouflaging them as beneficial for the farmers.
The environmental, health and economic issues related to HT crops have been well-debated already in India and abroad, and most countries do not allow HT crops for cultivation, irrespective of whether they have been bred using genetic engineering or not.

The emergence of super-weeds requiring the use of more and more deadly chemicals as a weed control technology in this approach, the increased levels of chemical residues in the food of consumers, the health impacts on farmers and farm workers when they work in chemically-sprayed fields and exposure to toxins, the fact that farm level sovereignty gets eroded when combo products of seeds and chemicals are controlled by external entities, the fact that this also means increased costs for farmers are all well-documented in scientific and other literature. In India, there is the additional concern with regard to socio-economic repercussions on poor agricultural labourers, that too poor rural women, with large scale use of HT seeds.
Meanwhile, while DSR has several advantages, experience in Punjab and Haryana is showing several practical challenges that farmers are encountering with DSR. It is not a universal solution for all types of soils, whether it is related to the textures of soil or nutrient availability, experience shows.
Against this backdrop, we wish to draw your attention to several additional facts:

1. Imazethapyr is in the list of “bannable” pesticides for which a public interest litigation has been filed in the Supreme Court of India, listing 110 pesticides which have been banned in 2 or more countries elsewhere but continuing to be used in India. Imazethapyr has not been approved in 27 countries of the EU and the UK, and banned in Turkey). Meanwhile, Pendimethalin features in a draft ban order issued by Government of India initially after the Anupam Verma Committee report, but retracted later on in an unscientific and unjustified manner. This has also been challenged in the PIL in the Supreme Court.
2. Importantly, Imazethapyr has not been legally registered for use in Paddy as per India’s insecticides regulatory regime! Its registered uses are only for soybean, groundnut, black gram, green gram and red gram. What are the seed containers of these HT basmati varieties stating, and what is the Imazethapyr label sold by dealers supposed to state? How did the ICAR take up research and later launch the varieties for commercial cultivation in blatant violation of the existing regulations? Will India’s pesticides regulatory regime now retro-fit this chemical into its registered uses without any testing?
3. Equally importantly, we demand that the Government of India and its regulators show how herbicide safety assessment takes place in the country now in the context of HT crops, even if they are non-GM HT crops. Where are the regulations and scientific protocols for testing these herbicides for safety for use on HT crops? How will residue levels be fixed by FSSAI if there are no testing protocols for the herbicides to begin with?
4. India is a Center of Origin and Diversity for rice, and among all other reasons, this certainly necessitates the application of the precautionary principle. Sufficient research has not been done in India on the long term effects of Imazethapyr tolerant rice varieties on traditional rice varieties.
5. Further, basmati rice is also exported from India, and many importing countries have already rejected India’s tea, spices, basmati, wheat and other consignments citing SPS criteria. What will be the fate of this Imazethapyr resistant HT basmati rice from India?
6. Paddy is used as a fodder crop. Some Imazethapyr labels warn against using Imazethapyr-sprayed crops as fodder for a stipulated period of time after spraying.

It is clear to us that while Imazethapyr and paddy varieties tolerant to it are being promoted with a façade that they are non-GM, that they would save water, farmers’ cost of cultivation, bring down stubble burning etc., the reality is that HT crops are being introduced by the Government of India surreptitiously even as it talks about natural farming and BPKP (Bharatiya Prakritik Krishi Paddhati). The biotech industry is surely excited about the introduction of HT crops such as these paddy varieties as non-GM, that too by the public sector route and hoping that this introduction will subsume the public resistance against these crops. However, this is not so. Through this letter, India’s farmers’ organisations and other civil society organisations would like to inform the Government of India that there will be stiff resistance from farmers and consumers. ICAR will have to face public protests if these HT varieties are not withdrawn immediately from the market. There will also be legal opposition through PILs since many matters of public interest have been ignored here.
In this regard, we urge you to step in to stop the distribution of this HT rice immediately. We also request you to ensure responsible science, statutory regulations and long term vision for our farming prevails in agricultural technology development in the country. 
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*Dr Narasimha Reddy Donthi, Public Policy Expert, Hyderabad; Kapil Shah, Jatan-A Mission for Sajiv Kheti, Vadodara; Kavitha Kuruganti, Coalition for a GM-Free India, Bangalore