The old little folks of Jajjal

‘‘We have been witnessing this problem among about 30 per cent students,’’ says Rekha Goyal, a science teacher at the school. ‘‘It worries us a lot,’’ she says, adding that experts from Delhi’s All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS) and social activists had visited the school and spoken with the students recently. The experts also visited other villages in this cotton belt and concluded that the problem was probably due to the contaminated ground water and excessive use of pesticides by farmers.

Balraj Singh, another teacher at the school says the village has already recorded a high incidence of cancer. In fact, the entire Malwa belt, the cotton heartland of Punjab of which Jajjal is a part, has been anxious over its health for the past few years.

Dr Ashutosh Halder, professor at the department of reproductive biology, AIIMS, who was leading the team of experts in the villages during an awareness campaign launched by an NGO Kheti Virasat, says the problems including premature ageing were due to the genetic (DNA) damage and attributed their incidence to toxic environmental factors.

‘‘Contamination of water can be responsible for these problems and the entire issue requires further study. You can not attribute this situation to misuse of pesticides alone,’’ says Halder. ‘‘I spoke to a few residents at Jajjal, Gianna and surrounding villages who appeared to be in their 50s or 60s. But I was surprised to learn that they were actually about 20 years younger. Some children, who were merely 12 years old, had almost 75 per cent grey hair. This is a matter of concern,’’ he says.

Surinder Singh, joint director, Kheti Virasat, says these problems were witnessed in villages which had a high incidence of cancer and cancer related deaths.

‘‘A comprehensive study, without causing any panic, can be the only solution for understanding and solving the problems. Triggering unnecessary alarm bells will not be of any help to the people,’’ he adds.

Raminderjeet Kaur Saini, who is pursuing Ph.D in Biology at Punjabi University and was a member of the team carrying out the study says that they found that the menstrual cycle of girls set in late here—at 14 to 16 years while it was 12 in other parts of the country.

Puberty in boys was delayed by about 2-3 years. Saini adds that they also observed the natural sex-ratio imbalance among the generation born in early 1980s when female foeticide was not prevalent in Punjab. Similar trends were also found in some villages in Faridkot district.