Kerala's endosulfan woes: Mayee committee report ignores vital issues
Much-awaited new EIA notification: another eyewash
Sunita Narain among top public intellectuals of the world: Prospect/FP list

1. The endosulfan case in Kerala: Mayee committee report disappoints. It ignores the vital issues of people's health and compensation for victims Since 2001, CSE has been instrumental in bringing to notice the endosulfan tragedy being played out in Kerala's Kasaragod district. In September 2004, the agriculture ministry had constituted a committee headed by C D Mayee, the then agriculture commissioner, to re-examine the entire issue and also to review the report of the O P Dubey committee; a lot of hopes were riding on this committee.

But the committee's report, even while accepting the demand to stop the spraying of endosulfan in Kerala, has completely ignored the evidence on people's health and the use of this particular pesticide in the region. It has also not looked into the issue of compensating the people of Padre, who have already suffered a lot.

The key reason for setting up the Mayee committee was the realisation that the earlier Dubey committee had not sufficiently looked at the evidence which established the presence of endosulfan residues in the blood of people and in the environment. Instead, the Dubey committee had based its findings on the report of the Tamil Nadu-based private laboratory Fredrick Institute of Plant Protection and Toxicology (FIPPAT) (now known as International Institute of Bio- technology and Toxicology), which was found to be based on manipulated data. For details on this, you can refer to Down To Earth's April 15, 2004 issue or download the relevant from our website.

The Mayee report devotes only one paragraph on the FIPPAT report. It does not indicate whether the committee re-examined the FIPPAT report and its basis. The Mayee committee has asked for further epidemiological research -- but this will only serve to delay the matter. This, of course, will suit the pesticide industry quite well, which is extremely reluctant to accept any responsibility for the ailments caused to people.

The stakes in this case are high, and it is an issue that needs to be written about. Here are some resource persons you could get in touch with for details:

Kushal P S Yadav, CSE,
New Delhi; has researched and written on this issue;
Ph 011-29955124, 29955125;
E-mail: kushal@cseindia.org

H N Saiyed
Scientist and pesticides expert, National Institute of Occupational Health (NIOH), Ahmedabad;
Ph 079-2268 6142; E-mail: saiyedhn@nioh.org

R Sridhar, Thanal, Thiruvananthapuram; has been following up the Kasaragod case consistently;
Ph 0471-5543001; E-mail: thanal@vsnl.com, thanal@md4.vsnl.net.in

2. Draft EIA notification 2005: still full of holes In our last media alert, we had brought to you the true state of the environmental impact assessment (EIA) process in India. Since then, the Union ministry of environment and forests (MoEF) has brought out the long-awaited, reengineered version of the new EIA notification.
   
One of the major drawbacks of the new notification is the dilution regarding the requirement of EIA for construction projects. In 2004, the 12th amendment to the 1994 EIA notification had brought large construction projects under the purview of EIA. Surprisingly, this has been undone in the new notification, which recognises only those projects with more than 100,000 sq m of built-up area as having any environmental impact that requires Central government clearance.

The new notification also fails to address the crucial issue of cumulative environmental impacts. At any given area, existing environmental pressure (considering the cumulative impact from all the ongoing and already cleared activities), and carrying capacity limits of the area should be a major criterion for deciding the environmental impacts of any additional activity in the area.

The draft notification is available on the MoEF's website for comments. You can see Down To Earth (September 15, 2005) for our cover story on EIAs or download it from our website. For further clarifications, you can contact the following:

R Sridhar, Convenor
Mines, Minerals and People,
New Delhi; Ph: 98107 06244, 011-29531814,
E-mail: ameindia@yahoo.com; well informed on most issues related to mining and environment, the regulatory regime, people's protests, etc

Kanchi Kohli
Kalpvriksha Environment Action Group, New Delhi;
Ph: 011-24316717, E-mail: kanchik@vsnl.com; has co-authored a report on the EIA notification of 1994 -- how effective it has been

R Chandramohan, joint secretary,
Union ministry of environment and forests,
New Delhi; Ph: 011-2436 2551; looks after EIAs in the ministry

3. Leading magazines include Sunita Narain in a list of world's top public intellectuals The Prospect/Foreign Policy list of the world's top 100 public intellectuals is out, and Sunita Narain, director, CSE, is one of the few Indians who feature in it. Prospect is a British magazine, while Foreign Policy (FP) is published from the US.

The global listing declares a public intellectual to be "someone who has shown distinction in their own field along with the ability to communicate ideas and influence debate outside of it". The list is about public influence, and not intrinsic achievement, says the FP website.

The list -- which has only 10 women candidates -- includes names like Nigerian novelist Chinua Achebe, US-based linguist and author Noam Chomsky, writer and activist Germaine Greere, and US economist Jeffrey Sachs. Among the Indians, besides Sunita, are novelist Salman Rushdie and economists Amartya Sen and Jagdish Bhagwati.

The magazines are now calling for a popular vote to select the five greatest public intellectuals from this list. For more details, you can visit www.foreignpolicy.com, or speak with Souparno Banerjee at the numbers given below.


We do hope all these leads and story ideas are useful. Do keep writing to us.