Get the GMO Out of My Mustard

India is the home of oilseed diversity--coconut, groundnut, linseed, niger, mustard and rapeseed, safflor, and sesame. Our food cultures have evolved with our biodiversity of oilseeds. Sarson is called "Sarsapa" and "Rajika" in Sanskrit. Diverse Varieties of Sarson are grown and used in India, including Krsna Sarsapa (Banarsi Rai), Sita Sarsapa (Pila Sarson), Rakta Sarsapa (Brown Sarson), Toria, and Taramira.

On August 27th, 1998, the government announced a policy of free import of soyabean, while simultaneously banning sale of mustard oil using the tragedy of adulteration of mustard oil in Delhi with argemone, diesel, waste oil. While it was referred to as the dropsy epidemic, our visits to hospitals showed multiple symptoms because of the multiple sources of adulteration. The interesting thing about the mustard tragedy was that ALL brands were affected, and only in Delhi. . A typical adulteration is in one brand across the supply chain.

Women from the slums of Delhi called us at Navdanya and said, "Our children are going to bed hungry because they cannot eat food cooked in soya oil." They also said, "Bring our mustard back."

Women prefer natural oils such as mustard to hydrogenated fats such as Dalda for health reasons and taste. Hydrogenated fats contain trans fats, which contribute to heart problems and strokes. Soya oil, too, is an industrial oil that uses benzene, a known carcinogen. Food should give us health, not disease; the poorest women know this fundamental fact.

Navdanya, with the National Women's Alliance for Food Sovereignty (Mahila Anna Swaraj), started the Sarson Satyagraha to bring back pure mustard oil. In 1998, the sound of "Sarson Bacao, Soyabean Bhagao" rang on the streets of Delhi. The first bottle of the Satyagraha Mustard Oil was gifted to the then Chief Minister of Delhi, Sahib Singh Varma. Today, we can enjoy our mustard oil because of the Sarson Satyagraha 1998.

Our mustard is again under threat from Dr. Deepak Pental of Delhi University, who has genetically engineered it for sterility and herbicide tolerance.

Not only do we not need genetically engineered mustard, but the traits being introduced in it are known to be hazardous and illegal under international and national law. Dr Pental has spent time in Tihar jail for stealing a colleague's Mustard work, but blatantly violating national and international laws that have been put in place to protect our biodiversity and farmers' rights is a far more serious crime.

The GMO mustard is based on what has been called "Terminator Technology," which sterilizes the harvested seed. The UN Convention on Biodiversity has banned the use of Terminator Technology, and it is also illegal under India's Plant Variety Protection and Farmers Rights Act. The US Department of Agriculture and Delta and Pine Land (now owned by Monsanto) hold the patent for this technology.

Dr. Pental used Terminator Technology based on the barnase gene, which is lethal to cells.

In addition to the terminator trait, GMO mustard has been engineered to be resistant to the herbicide Glufosinate. This herbicide halts photosynthesis, resulting in plant death. When Glufosinate is sprayed on fields, all other plants die except the herbicide-resistant GMO.

These are technologies for killing life, not technologies for growing food. They must be banned.

In India, we grow mustard with wheat on our small farms. Such mixtures increase productivity and farmers' incomes. However, herbicide-resistant GMO mustard kills wheat, lowers farm productivity, and undermines food security. Herbicide-resistant crops also put evolutionary pressure on weeds, contributing to the emergence of superweeds. Due to increased herbicide use, 50% of farmlands in the US are overrun by superweeds.

Additionally, GM mustard contaminates non-GMO mustard through pollination. Percy Scmeiser, a seed breeder in Canada, lost his canola line (canola is derived from mustard and gets its name from the breeding done in Canada) to contamination by Monsanto's RoundUp Ready Canola. Steve Marsh, an Australian Organic farmer, lost his Organic Certification because of Monsanto's GM canola.

The demand for pure organic mustard oil is growing in India since most edible oils are "blended" with GMO soya oil or GMO BT cotton seed oil. The introduction of GMO mustard with Terminator traits will deny Indian citizens the right to safe and pure mustard oil because of the risk of contamination.

The GM DNA can enter cells of unrelated species and be incorporated into the cell's genome through horizontal gene transfer. The genes involved are fatal.

Barnase is known to be harmful, if not lethal, to all cells, animals and humans included. When perfused into rat kidneys, barnase causes kidney damage. When the recombinases used for gene splicing are expressed at high levels in the sperm cells of transgenic mice, the males became 100% sterile. Sterility is caused directly by the recombinase enzyme scrambling the genome, essentially by breaking and rejoining DNA at inappropriate sites on the same or different chromosomes.

Because we need an independent assessment of these far-reaching Biosafety impacts, the Technical Expert Committee (TEC) of the Supreme Court has recommended a ten-year moratorium on GMO trials to create a robust system for Biosafety Regulation. Such regulation cannot be left to those involved in risky experiments who are also trying to push hazardous GMOs onto our farms and into our food.

In addition, the TEC has recommended that no herbicide-resistant crops be introduced in India because our farmers are small, and herbicides will destroy our biodiverse food crops, which are the basis of India's food and nutritional security. The TEC also recommended that we do not genetically engineer crops for which we are a 'center of diversity.' India is the home of the genetic diversity of mustard.

Thus, every law and scientific principle of Biosafety is being undermined to push Terminator Mustard on India's farmers and thalis. GMO mustard is justified because we are importing edible oils, which will reduce imports by increasing production. The claim that this Terminator Mustard will increase yields by 30% is scientifically false and a blatant lie.

The GMO hybrid cannot have higher yields than the non-GMO hybrid.

India imports edible oils because we were forced to. When Soya oil started flooding India's market in 1998, the International price was $150/ton, while the US government's subsidy to its soya producers was $190/ton. In effect, this was dumping.

The Indian government further subsidized soya oil for the PDS by Rs 15,000/ton, making imported soya oil artificially cheaper than domestically produced mustard oil.

We need to get rid of these distorting subsidies and unjust trade rules to defend our food sovereignty and ensure Indian's can have healthy and safe food Made in India by Indian farmers.

We need to stop the insanity of transforming mustard - the symbol of spring and abundance in our culture - into a toxic crop with terminator genes, sprayed with lethal herbicides that kill everything green, including the rich diversity of our crops and directly damage our health.

On July 31, 2015 we renewed the Sarson Satyagraha by taking a pledge at Gandhi Ji's memorial at Rajghat to protect the diversity, purity and safety of our mustard.

Join the Sarson Satyagraha. Commit to boycotting chemical and GM foods and eating organic and local foods. Food Freedom (Anna Swaraj) is our birthright.