BT-Brinjal the Bio War on India

8/14/2019 BT-Brinjal the Bio War on India

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BT-Brinjal the bio war on India

Is it Government sponsored terrorism or government approved bio war?

I would like to bring to the common mans reach certain activities which are

going to affect him and the planet in the long run and of which he is totallyunaware. These activities are going on either with the tacit connivance or activecooperation of those in power as well as the higher authorities and institutions ofthe academic world. This preamble leads naturally to two pertinent questions

What are these activities?Where it is going on?

Answers1. The controversial BT cotton.The controversial BT Brinjal.

2.Taking place in several acres of the poor Indian farmars lands.

The people of this country and all those who are interested in the BIODIVERSITYneed answers and clear cut explanations from the sponsors of this activity to thefollowing: -

Scientific doubts and unanswered questions on BT BRINJAL are much moredangerous than BT cotton because it is going to enter into your digestive system

Beware of BT Brinjals

Science without conscience is but ruin of the soul wrote Francois Rabelais. Weallow all types of havocs, to wreck the population, out of both ignorance andindifference. After the havoc takes place we give juicy explanations, have debatesand start the blame game. The very thought of allowing untested BT Brinjalssends shivers down the collective spine of innocent millions who would beconsuming it unaware of the possible dangers it can have on the health.Bureaucrats are either chicken hearted or operate with childish knowledge,media lacks the gall to oppose for fear of losing advertisement revenue from theperpetrators of these activities, at least scientist must extricate themselves fromthe shell of academicism and provide a welcome antidote by boldly spelling outthe possible health hazards. Now that we have information explosion, let us usethe full potential of our limbic brains and prevent the havoc instead of searching

for cures and culprits after the havoc.

We have clear cut right not to allow BT Brinjals it as per

1] Cartagena Protocol, which demands an extra-cautious approach for testing GMvarieties in regions where the crop originated.

1a] Peru, where potato originated, and Mexico, original home of corn, have a ban
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on genetic testing of these two. This comes from the fear that the alien gene,mostly sourced from other species, could escape (in some instances it indeed has)from the modified varieties, and contaminate the crops entire natural geneticdiversity

2] Brinjal originated in INDIA-

2a] I.S. Bisht, a principal scientist at the Delhi-based National Bureau of PlantGenetic Resources, asserts that Solanum melongena L (the botanical name forbrinjal) originated in the wild in India and adjoining areasa view seconded bynoted food historian K.T. Achaya, who also states that brinjal is an indigenousvegetable that originated from a wild ancestor. The bureau has acquired andconserved as many as 2,500 varieties of brinjal, 95 per cent of them from India.

2b] 4th century BC brinjal recipe from Ettuthogai, an ancient Tamil text: Smeargreen brinjal with gingelly oil. Roast it on charcoal and then peel it. Mash it whencold. Heat some more gingelly oil. Add mustard seeds, curry leaves, crushedpepper corns, ginger powder and chopped fresh ginger. Finally, add the mashedbrinjal and cook briefly till well-blended. (Courtesy: Jacob Aruni)

2c] the history of the popular Sode Matha temple, in Karnatakas Udupi district,is inseparable from the vegetable. Poisoned, Lord Hayavadana asked for anaivedyam prepared from a special type of brinjal called gulla. That variety isnow widely known as mattu gulla, the former being the name of the villagewhere it was first cultivated

2d] Brinjal is even older than Sanskrit, which had to borrow the word vartakaand vrntaka from the Munda language

3] Greatness of Brinjal. Dr. James S. McLester, well-known professor of medicineat the University of Alabama and one of the pioneers in treating nutritionaldeficiencies, says: "If a man would enjoy sustained vigor and would experiencehis normal expectancy ... he must eat a liberal quantity of good protein." Goodprotein means, of course, a complete protein-one containing all 10 essentialamino acids and Brinjal has almost all the essential amino acids Arginine, Lysine,Tryptophan, Phenylalanine, Methonine, Crystine, Theonine, Cystine, Threonine,Leucine, Isoleucine and Valine. It also has vitamins Thiamine , Riboflavin ,Niacin ,Panthothenic acid, VitaminC ,folic acid and mineralsCalcium,Iron,MagnesiumPhosphorus,Potassium,Zinc and Manganese. Eggplant

is ranked among the top ten vegetables in terms of its antioxidant content andhas fourteen different phenolic components, among them Chlorogenic acidamounted to 93 percent of total phenolic compounds.It helps to block theformation offree radicals and yields energy 82 kj. The roots of the eggplant areused against internal hemorrhage and asthma; the leaves and bark againstdysentery. This plant is also effective in the treatment of hypercholesterolemiaand in the control of cholesterol
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thiaminehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Riboflavinhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Niacinhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Folic_acidhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Folic_acidhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phosphorus#Biological_rolehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phosphorus#Biological_rolehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Potassium#Potassium_in_the_diet_and_by_supplementhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zinchttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zinchttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manganesehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Free_radicalshttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thiaminehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Riboflavinhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Niacinhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Folic_acidhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phosphorus#Biological_rolehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Potassium#Potassium_in_the_diet_and_by_supplementhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zinchttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manganesehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Free_radicals


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4] Brinjal is richer in nicotine than any other edible plant, with a concentration of100 ng/g (or 0.01 mg/100g.

5] Brinjal is high in histamines. A few proteins and at least one secondary

metabolite have been identified as potential allergens. These three factorsessential amino acids, nicotine and histamines make any gene inserted intoBRINJAL really deadly to the person who consumes it as it can get into the vitalbody organs and cause damage to health much faster.

6] Genes inserted into GM food survive digestive processes and are transferredinto the human body. They are known to have transferred themselves intointestinal bacteria too. Bt toxin had caused powerful immune responses andabnormal cell growth in mice. It has also been shown that all the Cry proteins inBt crops have amino acid sequence similar to known allergens and are hencepotential allergens.

7] Bt brinjal has been modified to produce anunknown chimeric insecticide toxin containing Cry1Ab and Cry1Ac modifiedsequences

8] Bt brinjal produces into the vegetable cells a proteininducing resistance towards at least kanamycin, a well known antibiotic

9] Is it necessary to have such crop in our system at the cost of economy of smallfarmers, export, environment, biodiversity and health of living beings? Thebiased people may stack their claim that it is safer for human consumption as

there may not be much pesticide residue. But the real thing is something seriousone which was not touched while experimenting.

10] Bt toxins have never been authorized as such for mammalian consumption.Artificial ones should not be either, before a more serious assessment.

11] Scientists discover influenza's Achilles heel: AntioxidantsAs the nation copes with a shortage of vaccines for H1N1 influenza, a team ofAlabama researchers have raised hopes that they have found an Achilles' heel forall strains of the fluantioxidants. In an article appearing in the November 2009

print issue of the FASEB Journal (http://www.fasebj.org) they show thatantioxidantsthe same substances found in plant-based foodsmight hold thekey in preventing the flu virus from wreaking havoc on our lungs.________________________If it is so will Brinjal work as it is ranked among the top ten vegetables in terms ofits antioxidant content and has fourteen different phenolic components, amongthem Chlorogenic acid amounted to 93 percent of total phenolic compounds


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Political questions1.India is having well planned system, at least that is what we all thought till

recently, how come this BT cotton or BT Brinjal enter so many acres of our soil bypassing so many existing research, administrative and security system.Here I am tempted to quote from an article titled GENE DREAM written byNIKKI VAN DER GAAG in the excellent magazine THE NEWINTERNATIONALIST , Biotechnology actually reduces the world's biodiversityby promoting certain species over others. Of the world's 220,000 plant species,only 150 are grown commercially and just 20 provide over 90 per cent of theworld's dietary energy. We are already massively over-dependent on a fraction ofthe species available. Genetically-engineered (and transnational-controlled)seeds will reduce this active stock even further. 5 Farmers in countries such asIndia are setting up their own seed banks in order to preserve the existing varietyof seeds rather than having to use those promoted by the biotechnologycorporations, for whom the Third World is a huge potential market.

Think of the Data from the pastIn the late 60s and early 70s due to cotton pest Baruch districts economysuffered.Are we interested in repeating a BARUCH OR GUNTOOR on the poor farmers?

What has happened to the consciousness of our academicians? Are they sufferingfrom what MANWELL and BAKER called the PARALYSIS OF CONSCIOUSNESSi.e. failure to speak out the truth out of fear of consequences, out of ambiguity orambivalence about the definitions or interpretations of ethical problems, and, of

course engaging in cover up. If this becomes the case then in the long run the veryimportance of academic excellence and scholarship will be eroded. After all todisseminate facts you dont need paradigm-busting ideas of scholars or tags ofPhDs to your name. All that you need is a heart felt concern for the future of theplanet.

Finally I would like all concerned citizens to ponder over the followingUNIVERSAL DECLARATION of the RIGHTS of POSTERITYWhich was drafted by the UK council for posterity initially by a gentleman calledProfessor Scorer and a group of other concerned people like ecologist HerbieGirardet, Tanya Schwarz of the Forest Peoples Support Group, Guy Dauncey

environmental consultant and Nicolas Albery of the Institute of SocialInventions.

UNIVERSAL DECLARATION OF THE RIGHTS OF POSTERITY(DRAFT, JULY 1989)

Whereas our descendants generations, although likely to prove far more


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numerous than ourselves, have no voice or vote in any of our political systems, wetherefore declare that all the generations yet to come, for as far into the future ashuman life survives on this planet, are entitled by natural justice to the followingrights, which those alive today have a duty to respect and uphold:

1.The right to inherit a planet that has been treated by its human occupants withthe utmost respect. And more particularly:2.The right to inherit a planet with oceans, lakes and atmosphere undamaged byhuman activity, with safeguards for planets climate, such as rainforests, stillintact.3.The right to inherit a planet with an undiminished diversity of species.4.The right to inherit adequately maintained reserves of fossil fuel and othermineral resources.5.The right to be born into world of human-scale societies, unravaged bypopulation excess.6.The right to inherit a world unmarred by nuclear or chemical wars, incidents orwastes.7.The right to expect that previous generations will have cleaned up theirpollution, repaired theirdamaged environments, on land, sea and in the air ( including outer space), andprotected places of natural beauty.8.The right to inherit political, legal, technological and social systems that respectindividual human dignity, such as those laid out in the UN Declaration of HumanRights.9.The right to inherit the full uncensored cultural heritage bequeathed by formergenerations, as expressed, for instance, in their art, history, literature, librariesand museums.10.The right of future generations to have their interests considered and, where

appropriate, represented by a competent advocate, in any present day tribunal orassembly that is deciding courses of action that might have harmful log-termconsequences.

Scientific doubts and unanswered questions on BT COTTON especially in termsof long term damage to the top soil and the allergic reactions.

1. The gene flow through pollen grains of BT cotton will take place and this willaffect other cotton varieties as well as allied species in due course and affectbiodiversity.2 . BT genes produce toxins that kill the early larval stages of insects. The nature

of the toxin is not made known to us i.e. endo-toxin or exo-toxin.3. The exo toxin is highly hazardous and it couples with ATP( AdenosineTriphosphate) and affect the energy metabolism and it may even cause the deathof higher animals.4. The root exudates of the plant will also carry the toxin into the soil and it willhave its effects on the soil and soil borne organisms.5. Since soil contains many useful organisms this chemical may affect the usefulorganisms and thereby interfere with the biodiversity in the soil.


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6. Since the cotton seed is used in feeding cattle and cotton seed proteins are usedin biscuit making, it is most likely that this toxin may carry over in food cycle andhave its unspecified effects which could be detrimental to health especially that ofthe children who eat biscuits.7. Cotton seed oil is used in cooking and we dont have any information whether

this oil is contaminated with this toxin.8. We dont know what is the amount of toxin present in unit area. Even if onemicrogram of toxin is present in one square centimeter of the plant surface thatwill ultimately amount to several kgs of toxins and this will be ploughed in situand its effect on the environment is not known..9. Besides this toxin is capable of killing only early larval stage it is not effectiveagainst other stages of insect larva .The grown up larva that feeds on thesematerial will develop resistance and it will interbreed in the nature system andproduce new races of insects that may not be tackled by existing means of controlthereby it will create a great loss to the economy. The results of geneticallyengineered crops are at best mixed and at worst disastrous. Both weeds andinsects in the surrounding areas have been known to develop immunities whichturn them into superweeds and superpests.10. In North Zone crop will be over before start of summer and dust storm willcome and it may carry the BT containing dust particles of cotton residue andleaves.

[email protected] letter from a leading scientist Na ruteh shrantasya sakhayay devaha-God doesnot help inactive people - Rig Veda (4.33.11)

SUNDARAMURTHY V.T,Sri Vaishnava Sri23, Maniyakarar Street, Veerakeralam, Coimbatore-641 007, Tamil Nadu, IndiaE- Mail : Phone: 0422-2473853

October 23/24, 2009

ToHonorable Shri.Jairam Ramesh,Union Minister,Ministry of Environment & Forests,

Paryavaran Bhavan,CGO Complex, Lodhi Road,New Delhi - 110 003E-Mail: Hon.Shri .Jairam Ramesh ,

Respected Sir.
mailto:[email protected]:[email protected]:[email protected]:[email protected]:[email protected]


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Pranam JII salute and bow my head Sir for having taken a decision not to hurry up with atransgenic crop and having given an opportunity to the public and stake holdersto open their minds to give their unbiased views on such crops.Sir your earlier statement that GM crop is acceptable but GM food is not is the

best one made by keeping the health of 120 cores of Indian and finest biodiversity of our country in the mind. As one of the citizens of this Nobel Countrywith the base intelligence I submit the following for your kind notice.

The Genetic improvement of crops by conventional and biotechnologyapproaches involves the addition of genetic variation to varieties and causechanges in the plant genome that result in unintended effects on crop traits. Butthe screening processes help to have the varieties with desirable traits.The dwarfgene in wheat and Rice besides making them highly fertiliser responsive laid thefoundation for Green revolution and prevented starvation death of billion peoplearound the world particularly the Indian sub continent.Thanks to Dr.NormanBorlaug. The fertilizer responsiveness made the mankind to over do in the systemto cause an irreversible damage to the Agro system. Similarly with cotton wherewe advocated the use of pesticides saying that they have Tonic effects andincrease the productivity. But over, indiscriminate use led into collapse of thesystem with unintended health hazards to human beings. These are all due toexistence of very little knowledge on the biochemistry and changed plantmetabolism under these situation and mono culture which replaced the existingpolycrop system in those days.

The 21 stTechnological Century provides us various tools to study and assess thebiological mechanism with ease. The Chinese group of scientists have elicitedhow the Bt- gene has modified the nitrogen metabolism and increased the free

amino acid, soluble protein, nitrate reductase and the glutamic-pyruvictransaminase activity in cotton (Chen, D.H. et al.Field Crops Res. 87: 235- 2442004). Such of these basic informations will aid for developing appropriateagronomy which may not go against the wellbeing of the system and will help tokeep our system intact to some extent.The transfer of genes into plants is one of the breeding methods likehybridization and mutagenesis and cannot be ignored or discarded as this modehelp to transfer specific gene into the matrix of the plant cell for getting a desiredeffect with in short time span. The advance made in the field of gene transferenabled the mankind to introduce the Bt-gene to the crop easily (Perlak, F.J etal..Proce. Natl. Acad.Sci, USA 91: 7217-7221, 1994) and get quick benefit as

against other methods. But there are some known and unknown implications thatare woven with this method and crops developed.

It has been conclusively established that the BT material exudes Bt proteinsthrough roots into the soil and gets accumulated to interact with the soil fauna.The insecticidal toxin binds tightly to clays and humic acids and persisting invarious soils for at least 234 days like DDT. We took several decades to ban theuse of DDT in our India as it has caused several irrevocable Ecological and health


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hazards. The same effects are likely to descend to our dynamic agro system withtransgenic crops.They besides creating the ecological problems that areassociated with monoculture agriculture may result in cumulative effects oftoxins in soils. The Scientists of Indian Institute of Agriculture Reseach (IARI),New Delhi have brought to light that the transgenic crop (Bt) has reduced the

total mineral-N+ NO3 -N) in soil by 14 % and enhanced P besides reducingDehydrogenase activity, and respiration of our own soil indicating that there isreduced activity of soil microflora (B. Sarkar et al., J. Agronomy & Crop Science194, 2008.). About seventy five percent of total area under cotton in our countryis under the transgenic materials and we do not know what is happening in oursoil in these areas in our system. If the soil ecosystem and its species dynamic areaffected it is difficult even to imagine what type of catastrophe will embrace ourcountry and her finest biodiversity.

The Bt materials are known to carry unknown fragments of RNA and DNAgenetic material and new proteins, but whose biological effects particularlytoxicity and allergic action for humans and animals are not fully brought to light.It has been reported that the unintended DNA and RNA fragments in geneticallymodified maize may bring some unexpected turbulences (Rosati et al. PlantMolecular Biology, 67: 271- 281(2008), and whether the presence of thesefragments are specific to certain Bt genes are not known. It has been reportedrecently that orally administered DNA is known to interact with the Immunesystem and if it is so what will be the effect of food containing the unintendedDNA is also not known. Scientists have evaluated the gut and peripheral immuneresponse to genetically modified maize in mice and found recurrent changes in

the immune system (Finamore et al. Journal of Agricultural and FoodChemistry 56:11533-11539, (2008) like T-cells). Such changes in the number of aspecial type of lymphocytes ( T-cells are known to be involved in the modulationof inflammatory response and associated with asthma or with untreated foodallergy in children. Alterations of the Immunopheno types induced by thetransgenic maize were associated with the increase in some cytokines (likeInterleukin 6 (IL-6), Interleukin 13, Interleukin 12p70 and MIP-1) which areimportant in the human immune response (Finamore et al. Journal ofAgricultural and Food Chemistry 56:11533-11539, (2008). It is note worthy thatScientists have also traced fragments of synthetic transgenes in the blood ofpiglets fed with transgene food.( Mazza et al. Transgenic Research ,14: 775-784,2005) and feared that these may interact with the immune system .

Laboratory animals fed GM foods have developed stomach lesions, intestinal

damage, and proliferative cell growth in the walls of the stomach and intestines.The only published human feeding experiment has revealed that the genesinserted into GM soya crops transfer into the intestinal bacteria and continue tofunction even after stopping to eat GM foods and this indicates that the GMproteins continuously producing in the human bodies.

GM soya and GM corn both contain at least one new unexpected allergen notfound in natural crops.


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Mice and rats fed GM food had resulted in smaller and partially atrophied liversand in some heavier which could signal inflammation.Both male and female animals displayed troubling reproductive problems whenfed GM soya Over half of the babies of mother rats fed GM soya died within three

weeks, compared to 10 percent of the non-GM soy offspring. The GM babies weresmaller and were unable to conceive in a subsequent study. Male rats and micefed GM soy had altered testicles, including fewer young sperm cells. (AmericanAcademy of Environmental Medicine & Respected most honored sir,

I am very happy at my 70 that you have kept up your finest decision GM crop isacceptable but GM food is notand saved the population, environmentbiodiversity and country and provided health security to your kith and kins.

I do not know how to express my gratitude and thank you. Your action equals toSri Ramas action.Jai Shri Ram!

India is no more a laboratory and her finest people are not Guinea Pigs orLaboratory animals.

Let our scientists to make critical study of our crop diversity and feed not only thehuman living in this divine country and also other needy people in othercountries as it has potential to feed two planet Earths With Assured irrigation,India's food grains output can increase SIX times and enough to feed two planetEarths!(United Nation).

Give direction to the scientific community to stop working with insertion of alienparticularly toxic genes into our crop plants.Let them try the TILLING /ZINIC-

NUCLEASE methods for manipulation of genes with in the species itself forgetting the desired traits as these may not trouble our system.

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BT-Brinjal the Bio War on India