FELICITATION OF LOCAL IDOL APPOINTED RAJYA SABHA M.P.

In a rare display of affection, citizens from Western Mumbai got together and felicitated Mr. Javed Aktar (Padma Shri -1999, Padma Bhushan - 2007 and dozens of other Film and National awards), on Sat. 08^th May 2010, on his being nominated M.P. to the Rajya Sabha. What was unusual was that the local politicians too were present with greetings for Javed Saab as he is popularly known. There were the local MP and Union Minister – Mr. Gurudas Kamat, local MLA – Mr. Ashok Jadhav, local Corporators – Mr. Adolf D’Souza and Mr. Devendra ‘Bala’ Amberkar. All know Javed Saab as a Urdu writer-lyricist-poet, but now he showed his thinker-reformer-politician side, during his acceptance speech. The audience of about 120 was made up of many Activists and well wishers from all over Western Mumbai, including Mr. G.L. Raheja a well known local businessman and philanthropist.

Volunteers from the Juhu NGO: Juhu Citizens Welfare Group, namely: Ms. Zahida Banatwala, Ms (Dr.) Sindhu Daftary, Ms. Bindu Parikh and Ms. Shabana Azmi took pains to organize the program with the support of local anonymous donors. A special plaque was presented to Javed Saab and saplings of the Lakshmi Taru (Simarouba glauca DC) were presented to the honoured local elected politicians. The Paradise Tree as it is also known is very good in CO2 absorption among other things. More can be found at the web links: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Simarouba_glauca http://aswathikasimadom.blogspot.com/2008/07/lakshmi-taru.html

A civic activist of decades Prof. Hansel D’Souza made a presentation, covering some of the local needs of consumers and citizens, cutting across all social strata. The idea was to present the focus areas to the new Rajya Sabha MP who is also a resident of the western suburbs. The issues covered implementation of: highway through the Pawan Hans Airport (instead of a Juhu Beach highway which would destroy the beach which happens to be the haunt of the poorer social strata and cost some twenty-three times more); re-development of local agro-markets (to reduce the incidence of illegal hawking on the new pavements); further development of local Municipal School (in view of increasing population and need for English medium education for the lower strata); control on illegal slums and encroachments along with cheaper mass housing; protection of mangroves, open spaces and Irla Nulla Beautification; development of a local Sports Complex at the location shown in the DP-1981 plan; further strengthening of the Nagar Raj Act in the local zone; banning of plastic bags of all sizes and specifications and banning of paan and gutka; decongestion of the city by development of the hinterland by a Central Planning Authority; stricter implementation of the ban on ‘land reclamation’ in view of Mahim Beach being lost to the monsoon seas; a common Beach Authority for the city and an integrated city transport authority for the extended business district of Greater Mumbai.

Local MP and Union Minister Mr. Gurudas Kamat after congratulating Javed Saab, mentioned the secular principles of the INC lead UPA Govt. at the Center and also the coalition Govt. in Maharashtra State. He expressed his willingness to sit with citizens for a dialogue and impressed on all the need for balanced development with minimum pain for the project-affected-persons (PAPs). He informed the august gathering that only the Union Govt could bear the costs of subsidizing the city rail-transport system which has not increased costs in the past six years and the impossibility of a ‘bullet train’ to cover the extended hinterland of Greater Mumbai. He confirmed that he was regularly visiting the constituency every weekend and interacting with citizens to understand their problems and guiding them.

The new MP - Javed Saab, talked of the need for all citizens to recognize the concept of ‘my country’ also being the ‘local area’ where ever the citizen resides and said patriotism also meant doing the best in ones’ own area instead of only looking for some big picture. He too showed interest in meeting with citizens to discuss in detail, their needs and plans for the area.

During the general fellowship following the felicitations, Mr. Adolf D’Souza, a first in India, consensus elected Corporator while congratulating the local hero Javed Saab, told the citizens of the need to be ecologically friendly and showed a Rs.2 cloth bag that he had just introduced as a viable alternative to the eco-polluting plastic bags. A token lot was launched the same day earlier, in the presence of over one hundred citizens from the Western Suburbs. The local MLA Mr. Ashok Jadhav interacted with many of the activists who knew him well. Mr. Shankar an activist from the local Nehru Nagar slum also interacted with the guests.

The program was anchored by Ms. Nita Bajpai and the vote of thanks was offered by Ms. Bindu Parikh, both local civic activists.

GMO products and their pain

More interesting reports on the dangers of GMO and the profit-centric human-phobic activity of Monsanto.

Check out the weed resistance report: http://crooksandliars.com/susie-madrak/weeds-are-now-resisting-monsanto-weed Also enjoy the comments at the end of the report.

This must be given the widest possible publicity so that more Governments and farms do not fall prey to the so called new technology which is not tested for decades and which lacks citizen monitoring. It would be best if testing is done in fully protected areas and labeling of GMO is made mandatory.

The First Green Revolution in India of the 1970s, got quick results and slow pain in that: more pesticides, more fertilizer, more water and more power is needed to grow the new seeds. Also the seed efficacy seems to drop with time and nurtured saplings and seeds are often needed. This realization took 40 years in coming. This is the time it takes to determine the downside, when humans interfere with nature which has evolved processes and products over hundreds of millennium. Again this pain and time was for cross bred seeds from same species. Imagine now the surprises in store when inter-species breeding is done.

The new GMO products come from DNA tampering of cross-species of plants and bacteria and such products are trumpeted as a 'new green revolution' without the decades of observation and trials. No one can foresee the new pain in store after fifty years. No doubt the supporters will say ... we will come up with newer and costlier solutions and more patents and more IPR and more corporate profits. The ordinary farmers who were free and whole communities who thought they have freedom to choose will become indentured labour, working away for unknown corporate gains. The pain and anxiety will continue to grow.

The NOW SOLUTION is to isolate such work, have citizen group monitoring, observe for decades, mandate GMO labeling, conduct closely monitored trials in different zones and specifically look for unintended effects on other species due to the new GMO products and also for high levels of allergens and 'unintended viral and bacterial resistance'. Think about 'terminator genes', 'gene silencing' and 'unintended gene mutations'. Do not forget perpetuating bio-diversity. Most important remember this Earth is our only home.

ACT NOW FOR A BETTER FUTURE. Give widest publicity and lobby with your elected representatives for a safer tomorrow.

Seven Issues for the GMO promoters ...

It will be revealing to read the link: http://www.gmfoodnews.com/gmwho.html

Pronouncements such as follows are often made by 'GMO supporters' to support the 'infectious greed' of some Corporates:

"Food biotechnology is not a new phenomenon. Since Roman times, plants have been selectively crossbred to develop crops that are tastier, more hearty and more resistant to certain pests and plant diseases than their predecessors. Modern biotechnology provides an ability to transfer desired traits into plants much faster and more selectively. This, in turn, can result in fewer pesticides being used, greater conservation of land and water, better tasting and more nutritional foods and more abundant food supplies to address world hunger." ... Quaker -
USA.

"We do believe that the responsible use of gene technology in agriculture will bring benefits to farmers, industry and consumers. We are therefore prepared to use ingredients which may be derived from genetically modified crops where it is necessary to do so or a clear benefit can be shown..." ... Nestle, UK.

On the other hand, the more human-centric and ethical organizations take a cautious stand as shown below:

"Caterers have delivered Monsanto the final insult by banning genetically modified food from the GM giant's own staff canteen "in response to concern raised by our customers." ... Monsanto Staff Canteen, UK.

"We have recently decided to remove GM ingredients from products wherever it is practical to do so. This will reduce considerably the number of products containing such ingredients, while maintaining the range available to our customers. At the same time Tesco will provide increased GM-free options by adding to the number of items in our organic range. We are already energetically seeking reliable sources of genuinely GM free ingredients and are pleased that Greenpeace has agreed to discuss working with us to meet this challenge." ... Tesco, UK.

The pro-GMO initiatives, fail to address the following fundamental issues:

1. food biotechnology does not only mean GMO. Its time to refocus on the self-healing processes of nature instead of rushing to synthesized chemicals for all solutions.

2. that since times immemorial, intra-species crossbred plants, which anyway would occur in nature, have been and continue to be used, without any overt damage to plant or animal life or without affecting general bio-diversity on planet Earth. Earth continues to be our ONLY HOME.

3. that the new GMO products are derived from inter-species cross breeding purposefully done between plant and animal (bacteria) in a most un-natural manner (by interfering with the DNA), which would never occur in nature, without any historic data (forget since Roman times), with unknown damage 'over decades' to plant and animal life as collateral damage, and certainly affecting bio-diversity in the worst way. The lack of verifyable historic data on 'gene silencing', 'gene mutations', 'single gene means single protien', due to the un-natural inteference in processes evolved over many milleniam, are never publicly discussed.

4. the hard facts do not support reduced use of pesticides, fertiliser, water, power and even productivity of GMO products decreases with time. The First Green Revolution of 1970s in India is a typical case. Whereas productivity increased manifold for many years, it did deteriorate over time and use of pesticides, fertilizer, water and power increased sequentially. Now after some 40 years the great achievements do not seem so great. We have huge subsidies for farmers and their inputs and still have them poor and distressed. The Green in their life is gone. Let us therefore observe and monitor, by including all stake holders, such intrinsic changes in the new GMO products, for many decades, before spreading their use across continents.

5. the lack of desire to label food products with GMO origin, constituents, ingridients or derivatives is unexplained. Why the desire to take away the right to 'informed consent' or 'right to choice' from Consumers? India must mandate such labeling and also some 'cautionary message' with immediate effect even if USA Regulatory Authorities fail in their duty to keep open choice for their own citizens.

6. how are Consumers who believe in 'a pure vegetarian food habit' to be satisfied if inter-species gene manipulation of GMO food products are not being labeled? Why should their rights of belief and practice be trampled upon? The easy solution is to mandate compulsory GMO labeling as with the current Green - Red dot practice on all packaged food.

7. why challenge the processes of nature, developed over hundreds of milleniam without even two human generations of observations, trials, study, collateral damages evaluation, etc. Why the haste to make waste. It must never be forgotten that bio-diversity must never be disturbed while tinkering with nature. We should learn from our last century experiments with economy management, industrialization, division of the planet into so called nations based on political ideology, loss of thousands of species, nuclear power misuse, health mis-management with questionable drugs and vaccines.

Earth continues to be human-kinds only home. Patience is the key when it comes to deciding the future of billions of human, animal, insect and plant life. They all have varying degree of consciousness and a few human scientists and corporates must not abrograte to themselves, the right to decide their future, primarily because they have not participated in their creation or nurture.