Dear Citizens,

The whole world is standing against Genetically Modified (GM) food, due to its hazardous impact on health and environmental impacts. Even in the countries where Commercial production of GM food is allowed, people are shunning GM, and are ready to pay a much higher price for non-GM food to safeguard their health.

Thanks to the opposition by Swadeshi Jagran Manch and many other like minded organisations, Bt brinjal and genetically modified mustard was stopped from entering our food chain, as no permission has been granted for commercial production of GM food crops, and rather a moratorium has been imposed on the same.

However, the citizens are faced with a new threat, from no less than the regulator Food Safety and Standards Authority of India (FSSAI) itself. It’s notable that FSSAI is supposed to lay down science based standards for articles of food and to regulate their manufacture, storage, distribution, sale and import to ensure availability of safe and wholesome food for human consumption.

As of now there are no genetically modified ingredients or foods approved for human consumption in India by FSSAI.

New draft regulations proposed by FSSAI will allow GM foods onto our plates. The new regulations drafted by FSSAI are weak in their scope to effectively regulate GMOs and do not protect citizens in any sound way.

The regulations have not envisaged regular independent testing, or a stringent threshold limit for labelling. No testing or collection of data or review of approved GM ingredients means that adverse health effects will not be traced back to these GMOs.

If this FSSAI regulation comes into effect, we will face the situation where a plethora of GM foods will become part of our consumption, leaving us with no choice of avoiding it as most large food importers will be able to import their foods with GM ingredients into India.

Dear citizens, wake up, and take action urgently as we are facing a new threat with the draft regulations proposed by FSSAI. SIGN THE PETITION NOW!

In view of the seriousness of the matter, I request each one of you to take this up personally. Sign this petition and send your own letter to FSSAI at the earliest. It concerns the integrity of our own food and what we feed our loved ones. We need to act unequivocally to ensure that our food remains free of hazardous GMOs.

Dr Ashwani Mahajan