It is early to say if 2002 will go down as the year that the rains failed, but the misery in many parts is unquestionably extreme and profound. Every inhabitant of this sub-continent, I think, has secretly wished that we could be freed from this primeval bondage. The grand dream was always to connect the waters of the Ganges to the Kaveri, and one English engineer even forced a debate in the British parliament in the mid-19th century, where he argued that instead of building railways in India, Britain ought to develop inland waterways by connecting its rivers and join up the country through a network of canals. In this way one would create not only a transport network, but irrigate the country, bring abundance and prosperity, and even create a richer market for British goods. The railway lobby was, however, too strong for this sensible idea to take root.
Forget the dream--the reality today is that public investment in irrigation has been declining for years and we spend more on stocking grains than on all of rural infrastructure. This summer, just before the panic caused by the delayed rains, I happened to come across a letter from the Nobel Prize winning scientist, Norman Borlaug, who had helped create the hybrid technology that brought about our green revolution. It is dated April 12, 2002 and addressed M S Swaminathan, George Varughese, MV Rao, and RS Paroda. I quote from this letter because it shows how environmentalists and babus are also undermining our farmers' future:
“Approval [of Bt cotton] has been a long, slow, painful process, effectively delayed, I assume, by the lobbying of Vandana Shiva and her crowd. Now that the door has been opened for the use of transgenic biotechnology on one crop, I hope it will soon be approved for other crops. The recent tactics in the use of the 'precautionary principle' is a dangerous game plan, especially when a country is under heavy population pressure. As an enthusiastic friend of India, I have been dismayed to see it lagging behind in the approval of transgenic crops while China forges ahead.
“I was very supportive of the environmental movement when it began in the 1960s. However, in recent years, the movement has been captured and destroyed by elitists, and has evolved more and more toward an anti-science, anti-technology reactionary force. Too many of its leaders are opposed to high-yield crop production technology…Let us remember the courageous decision made by C. Subramaniam that ignited the Green Revolution in 1966. Thank God, Subramaniam was not paralysed by the 'precautionary principle.' Look at the results--a six-fold increase in wheat production and a three-fold increase in rice production over the past 40 years. How would 500 million additional Indians have been fed without this great transformation?”
This letter from a friend teaches that by employing new technology sensibly and vigorously we can create a second green revolution, and bring freedom from monsoon's bondage. His “precautionary principle” is a polite word for bureaucratic cowardliness, and Bt cotton is the miracle seed that resists bollworm, a disease which destroys a third of our cotton crop, and members of the many committees who postponed approval of Bt cotton year after year for six years have their hands covered in blood from the suicides of cotton farmers.
Prime Minister Vajpayee is a capable man when he applies himself. The success of his telecom and IT policies testify to it. Three years ago he dreamt of joining the country with a network of modern highways--one connecting the four metros and the others going north-south and east-west. All of us thought at the time that here is another Rs 60,000 crore pipe dream. But, who would have imagined it--the dream is quietly becoming real, thanks to the road cess and outstanding leadership at the National Highways Authority. Now, Mr Vajpayee needs to apply himself to agriculture and do what he has recently done in Finance--bring a bold new minister and revive the old Subramanium spirit.