Narkya—and the plunder of biodiversity

The headlines were arresting. “Improbable that company bought stolen forest item; cases quashed,” said a leading newspaper in Mumbai. “Cancer drug camptothecin not forest produce—Bombay High Court quashes cases against pharma company after 16 years,” proclaimed a well-known legal website in early January. Other publications had similar reports exonerating Fresenius Kabi Oncology, the Indian offshoot of German multinational Fresenius Kabi, of any wrongdoing in the purchase of camptothecin, which is used to make cancer drugs. The case is actually 18 years old—it was initiated in 2005—and illustrates why India’s rich biodiversity is depleting ever faster.

This story starts with a moderate-sized tree, Mappia foetida, known locally known as narkya or amruta, which is found in the Western Ghats. It grows to a height of 4-10 metres and is characterised by a fetid smell. Once, it was found abundantly, but today, narkya is a threatened species because it is an important medicinal plant, much in demand for its anti-cancer properties. The alkaloid camptothecin (CPT), extracted from the wood chips of the trees, is an essential component of chemotherapy and narkya is said to be the most promising source for large-scale production of CPT. The illegal felling of narkya and the production of CPT form the substance of this case, which has proved a futile exercise by the forest department in nabbing the culprits. The 18-year-old case filed by the state of Maharashtra and conservator of forest, Kolhapur, involves the illegal felling of narkya trees in Chandoli National Park in Maharashtra. It was detected in April 2005 and cases were filed against 223 persons for offences punishable under the provisions of the Wildlife (Protection) Act, 1972, the Indian Forest Act, 1927, and the Bombay Forest Rules, 1942.

According to court documents, the investigation team successfully discovered the entire chain of accused persons involved in the crimes, right from cutting narkya trees to the manufacturing of CPT. A vast number of bags containing narkya wood chips worth lakhs of rupees were seized from Chandoli National Park and other places, along with 1,110 kg of narkya extract from Hyderabad and Ahmedabad. What is pivotal to the case is the seizure of 22 kg of CPT valued at Rs 44 lakh from the manufacturing unit of Fresenius Kabi Oncology in Kalyani, West Bengal. The company was then known as Dabur Pharma, before the takeover by Fresenius Kabi was finalised. The company is among the world’s largest manufacturer of key anti-cancer APIs or active pharmaceutical ingredients which form the basis of a drug.

CPT was supplied by Coral Drugs, which is known as an integrated, research-based global pharma company that produces a wide range of APIs. The seized items comprised of narkya wood chips, crude jelly, crude camptothecin and the final product CPT. In short, all the above products were derived from the stolen narkya wood. A team from the wildlife department had visited the Kalyani plant and after exploring the nexus, seized the 22 kg of CPT. The material seized was the subject matter of the criminal proceedings in the Sangli and Kolhapur district courts. Other companies accused in the illegal narkya-felling case are Universal Chemical Industries, Hyderabad, Somaiya Farms and Organic Products, Gujarat and Naturite Agro Products, Hyderabad.

The case would wind its way through the various courts before dealing a thorough setback to the forest department in its efforts to stop the illicit trade in a scarce resource. In 2010, Fresenius Kabi Oncology and the factory manager of its Kalyani plant filed petitions in the High Court for quashing the criminal proceedings, contending that it had purchased CPT from another firm and had absolutely no knowledge that it was extracted from illegally removed narkya trees. It also claimed that CPT was not forest produce and, therefore, neither the company nor any of its representatives could be prosecuted for illegal removal of forest produce. This argument was based on an earlier Supreme Court decision showing that CPT was not forest produce.

The Bombay High Court found merit in this and stated that “it is highly improbable that the petitioner company would buy an illegal ‘forest produce’ for such a huge price, that too at the risk of its prosecution for serious offences.” Prosecution of the petitioners in the illegal narkya cases was thus unwarranted.

One of the problematic issues in the narkya case and to similar litigation is the Supreme Court’s 1996 interpretation of forest produce. It had declared that “if a product, commercially new and distinct, known to the business community as totally different is brought into existence by human labour, such an article and product would cease to be a forest-produce.”

Narkya, meanwhile, is becoming ever more scarce. According to a paper published by a University of Pune researcher, the tree is being exploited clandestinely in the domestic market and is also shipped abroad. “The profit potential is enormous as the alkaloid extracted from the plant is an essential component of chemotherapy,” it says. Each dose is estimated to cost Rs 1.5-2 lakh here.

For more than a decade, conservation experts have been warning that medicinal plants in the Western Ghats are facing the threat of extinction. A study done in 2012 in the Kalakkad Mundanthurai Tiger Reserve found that a primary reason was the excessive collection of these plants for use in traditional remedies. Yet, the government is whittling down laws to allow a free rein to the traditional medicine industry, some of whom are among India’s top corporate giants. Last year, it watered down the provisions of the Biological Diversity Act, 2002, to exempt the AYUSH industry (ayurveda, yoga and naturopathy, unani, siddha and homeopathy companies) from sharing the benefits of using the country’s bioresources with the local communities that nurture these.

With the Narendra Modi government proving indifferent to the conservation and sustainable use of the country’s priceless biodiversity in order to promote “ease of doing business”, as it stated in Parliament, there is little to deter companies and the trade from marauding our biosphere hotspots.

It is curious that the many criminal charges listed in the narkya case do not cite the Biodiversity Act. But then, very few of the endangered species are covered by the Act or by the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES) or even the Wildlife (Protection) Act.

Given the success rate of the forest department in proving biopiracy in the courts, it would seem that the saving of India’s biological diversity is a lost cause. 

This will first be published in the 16-31 January, 2024 print edition of Down To Earth

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