The Supreme Court on Tuesday delivered a split verdict on a petition challenging the conditional approval granted by the Genetic Engineering Appraisal Committee (GEAC) to the Delhi University’s Centre for Genetic Manipulation of Crop Plants (CGMCP), for the environmental release of transgenic mustard, DMH-11, and its subsequent approval by the Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change (MoEF&CC), with one of the judges striking it down and the other upholding it. While Justice B V Nagarathna, who was part of the two-judge bench, held the decision as “vitiated”, Justice Sanjay Karol, who was the other judge on the bench upheld it as “independent, reasoned and in consonance with the rules (Rules for manufacture, use, import, export and the storage of hazardous microorganisms, genetically engineered organisms or cells, 1989).” Both the judges, however, asked the centre to formulate a national policy on genetically modified (GM) crops and organisms and to ensure compliance with labelling of GM foods, in accordance with the Food Safety and Security Act, 2006. Justice Nagarathna noted that the grant of approval by GEAC is governed by Rule 13 of the 1989 Rules, she said that it “does not contemplate any role for. MoEF&CC in the decision-making process” and “therefore, the lateral intervention by the said Ministry seriously undermines the credibility and integrity of the decision making as well as the regulatory process”. Justice Karol, however, said that the “conditional approval granted. shows that the approval. was on the basis of multiple documents and not only the comments of the expert committee, as alleged by the petitioners”. He said that “the conditional release of DMH-11 was made subject to several conditions including, among others, that the MoEFCC/ GEAC may impose further conditions as may be necessary”. “The effect of accepting the submission. would mean that a person of science, by being a member, simpliciter of the Government body, would be discounted as an ‘expert’.”
