People's Democracy

UPA Govt on Endosulfan:

More Loyal than the King

K Rajendran

THE central government has once again unashamedly voiced its support for the deadly chemical endosulfan that has been denounced worldwide. By neglecting the protests as well as the scientific studies about this chemical, the Ministry of Agriculture has submitted to the Supreme Court that endosulfan has no detrimental effects on health. This was in response to the special leave petition filed by the Democratic Youth Federation of India (DYFI) in the Supreme Court. This recourse to judiciary was necessitated due to the stand taken by the central government at the Stockholm convention where its representative hobnobbed with the chemical corporate giant Excel and they jointly pressured other countries for not banning endosulfan. However, their lobbying failed. India too was compelled to soften its stand due to both the public outcry in Kerala and the stiff stand taken by other countries.

CONTOURS OF 

A NASTY DESIGN

Though India admitted at Stockholm that endosulfan is a hazardous chemical, it sought exemptions and utilising some loopholes it wanted to postpone the banning for up to 11 years. The affidavit filed by the central government, the latest report of the Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR), subsequent to the one day field study in the affected areas of Kasargod and the legal action initiated by Excel against the Calicut Government Medical College scientist who had conducted a study on the health hazards of endosulfan are indicators of a nasty design.

The centre’s much repeated argument is that no scientific study has found endosulfan as the root cause of health hazards in Kasargod. Another vicious argument from the central government is that its impact is evident only in some areas of Kasargod, which does not necessitate a national ban. These arguments are ridiculous. At least 10 studies have concluded that endosulfan is causing health hazards. Further, its disastrous consequences are being witnessed in many countries and acknowledged by them. It was by neglecting the findings of the earlier studies that the ICMR ridiculously suggested to conduct one more expert study to find out the health hazards in the affected areas. It is like adding insult to injury.

On this issue, the Congress party in Kerala is caught between the devil and the deep sea, as it was union food minister K V Thomas who sparked off the controversy by his public support to the chemical. Expecting an outcry, the Kerala Pradesh Congress Committee did not support him while chief minister Oomen Chandy is vociferous about banning endosulfan. But the party’s national leadership is unmindful. The Kerala government and KPCC are in a dilemma due to their own party spokesman in Delhi and high profile lawyer, Manu Abhishek Singhvi, is batting for the endosulfan in Supreme Court. Many top leaders of the party in Kerala have sought his ouster from the position of Congress party’s spokesman. Earlier the same Singhvi had appeared before Kerala High Court for the powerful lottery lobby in the controversial lottery case --- against the KPCC’s official stand in the issue. Due to the influx of complaints from Congress leaders of Kerala, Singhvi was then prevented for some time from conducting Congress briefings. Now too, the Congress high command is facing similar situation.

THREATS: AN

OLD TACTIC

It may be noted that the Department of Community Medicine, Calicut Medical College had conducted a study on the health hazards endosulfan poses in the cashew plantations in Kerala and Karnataka and its findings were alarming. (It was funded by the Kerala government's Ministry of Health and Family Welfare) However, Excel Crop Care, the producer of endosulfan, sent a legal notice to the researchers, asking them to withdraw their findings or face legal action. The doctors who have been sent these notices are T Jayakrishnan, C Prabhakumari and Thomas Bina, as well as C Ravindran, the principal of the college.

The notices were sent on July 20 and the company has asked the college to withdraw its report and apologise publicly by July 28. “It is a government report. We just conducted the study and submitted it to them. Now it is the prerogative of the government to withdraw it or keep it,” said Ravindran.

The company has also sent a legal notice to S Muralidharan, a scientist at the Salim Ali Centre for Ornithology and Natural History (SACON), in Kerala. Muralidharan had analysed the data that were sent to SACON by the Calicut Medical College. He said it was unethical, unfair and unheard of and if some people have a problem with a scientific study, they should challenge it with another study rather than sending legal notices and asking for withdrawal of the study.

“This is an old tactic of the endosulfan manufacturers. They always try to attack scientists who indict endosulfan. They know that this study will be cited by the Indian Council for Medical Research (ICMR) in the Supreme Court. As it is against them, they want to apply all kinds of pressure,” said P Karunakaran, CPI(M) leader and a member of parliament from Kasaragod. It should be the State’s responsibility to stand up for the doctors and take cognisance of the legal notice, he added.

This, in fact, is not the first time the endosulfan manufacturers have used such scare tactics. The Centre for Environment and Agrochemicals (CEA), started by the endosulfan manufacturers, had previously sent notices to the National Institute of Occupational Health (NIOH) in 2006, asking for an unconditional apology in writing and withdrawal of its report with immediate effect. In the same year, another organisation, the Crop Care Federation of India (CCFI), sent a legal notice to Centre for Science and Environment (CSE), a non-profit organisation based in Delhi, demanding immediate withdrawal of the study that probed the health hazards endosulfan had been posing.

But the legal notices sent to the Calicut Medical College are ill timed. The ICMR has been heavily relying on this study to prepare its interim report for the Supreme Court. Along with the agriculture commissioner, the organisation is part of the joint committee appointed by the Supreme Court, which has to file an interim report before the Court when it summons them on August 5. The Supreme Court had imposed an interim ban on the pesticide on May 13 and will take a decision on either imposing a permanent ban or lifting the ban on the basis of the report the joint committee would file. The leader of opposition in Kerala assembly and the former chief minister, V S Achuthanandan, is seeking to persuade the present chief minister, Oomen Chandy, to stand up for the doctors and scientists.

Following the study, the ICMR team visited Kasaragod once in May and again in July end. An expert team headed by Viswa Mohan Kadoch, DG ICMR, conducted a field study in the affected regions of Kerala and Karnataka. Their visit was fascinating because they hardly spent one day in Kasargod. In fact, the people in the affected regions are getting tired of the incessant study tours of the so called experts. After spending few hours in this region, the committee submitted its report on August 4. Their suggestions were pre -determined. By dancing to the tune of corporate giants, the committee denounced the demands for a country wide ban of endosulphan and suggested to confine the banning to only Kerala and Karnataka – as though the lives of people elsewhere in the country do not matter!  

STOCKHOLM

CONVENTION

On the other hand, April 29, the last day of the Stockholm convention at Geneva brought some good news for those crusading against endosulfan in India. Endosulfan was finally brought under the Annex A of the convention, which means it should be banned globally. But the caveat is that a country can ask for exemptions from the global ban on its production and use for five years and that this period can be extended to ten years, following which it will take another one year for the ban to be executed. India, China and Uganda, are the only three countries that have asked for exemptions. For the majority of countries that have not asked for exemptions, the ban will come into force in a year.

India now has to ratify its decision in a cabinet meeting and convey it to the Stockholm convention so that the exemptions and financial support are granted to India. From the global ban, India has asked for an exemption for pests affecting 14 crops, which in effect means it is for all the crops for which endosulfan has been registered with the Central Insecticides Board. Later, India softened its stand but only after it had earned notoriety for having opposed a ban on endosulfan in the international arena ever since it was introduced as a persistent organic pollutant in the fourth Stockholm convention in 2008.

“The efforts also assure that the Stockholm convention POP Review Committee will work with parties and observers to come up with alternatives. Further, it is also decided that the convention will provide financial assistance to the developing countries to replace endosulfan with alternatives,” said C Jayakumar who attended the convention as an observer from India.

Back home, after the union agriculture ministry wrote on April 27 to all the states seeking their views on the use of endosulfan, the Farmers Welfare and Agriculture Development Ministry of Madhya Pradesh, in its reply on April 28, registered its support to the Kerala ban on the pesticide. On his part, the then Kerala chief minister V S Achuthanandan appealed to all the other chief ministers to support a ban on endosulfan and write to the centre.

On April 28, talks opened on the continuation of DDT that is listed under Annex B of the Stockholm convention. A listing in Annex B means that a chemical or pesticide has to be phased out gradually; it would continue with certain exemptions and till such time that an alternative can be found. In India, DDT is being used as a vector disease control. On its part, India reported that it is producing DDT under strict control and that its use has come down by half --- from 10,000 metric tonnes in 1997 to 5,500 metric tonnes in 2010.  

On the other hand, endosulfan is now moving towards a global ban.

The Indian delegation that had been claiming that FAO reports said endosulfan was not hazardous, received a jolt when the FAO refuted India’s claim and stated that endosulfan is a hazardous pesticide.