Question

which was india's first transgenic crop

Answer 1

India’s first transgenic food crop edges toward approval

NEW DELHI—India has moved a big step closer toward embracing its first genetically modified (GM) food crop. In a safety reviewreleased yesterday, the environment ministry finds that GM mustard “does not raise any public health or safety concerns for human beings and animals.”

Backers feel vindicated. “The biosafety study that has been carried out is as thorough as it can be, and now ideology should not overwhelm scientific evidence,” says Deepak Pental, a plant geneticist at the University of Delhi here who developed the GM variety. Critics are unswayed. “The conclusions are based on inadequate experimentation,” says Pushpa M. Bhargava, a plant molecular biologist and former director of the Centre for Cellular and Molecular Biology in Hyderabad, India. Bhargava acknowledged that he had not fully read the report before ScienceInsider went to press.

India in 2004 introduced GM cotton, which now comprises more than 90% of all cotton cultivated in the country. But it has been leery of allowing widespread cultivation of GM food crops. In 2010, the environment ministry put on hold the commercial planting of GM brinjal, an eggplant variety, equipped with a bacterial gene that thwarts insect pests. The moratorium continues and is unlikely to be lifted anytime soon.

Answer 2

First transgenic crop in India:Of the three gm food crops in India -- brinjal, mustard and potato -- awaiting permission for large-scale field trials and seed production, brinjal is the first one to get geac approval. Bt cotton is the only other gm crop permitted in the country.