India: Supreme Court stays commercial release of GM mustard till October 17

The Supreme Court on Friday stayed the commercial release of the genetically modified (GM) variety of mustard till October 17, on a petition that this could have severe consequences on the environment and human health.

The petition, filed a day earlier by an Aruna Rodrigues, had sought a moratorium on open-field trials and commercial release of all herbicide-tolerant crops such as the Dhara Mustard Hybrid DMH 11 seed, earlier certified as safe for human consumption and the environment by a technical committee under the environment ministry. The court will now hear the case on October 17, said Pranav Sachdeva, an advocate from the office of the principal attorney for the petitioner, Prashant Bhushan.

On Thursday, the ministry said it had 759 public comments on the decision of the committee, after protests by several environmental and farmer bodies. The comments will be examined the same committee. Environment minister Anil Madhav Dave had on Thursday refused to fix a deadline by when the committee would give its findings.

On September 5, the technical committee, under the environment ministry’s Genetic Engineering Appraisal Committee, regulator for GM crops, had approved the environmental release of the hybrid DMH-11. Activists have contested various points on the panel's decision on assessing the environmental impact of releasing the hybrid. Their claims include one that the assessment for DMH-11 involved significantly fewer tests than had been done for the earlier such food crop, BT brinjal.

The petition also pleads the court implement a recommendation of a Supreme Court-appointed committee to stay all GM testing. That panel had in 2012 advocated a 10-year moratorium on commercial release of GM crops, arguing the lack of definite information on long-term impact of GM crops on other food crops.