Biopiracy

Jatropha germplasm theft in Chhattisgarh

 
By Alok Prakash Putul
Published: Tuesday 28 February 2006

alok prakash putul Raipur



three months after the theft of germplasm of Jatropha carcus from the Indira Gandhi Agricultural University (igau) in Raipur, the guilty have still not been traced.

It is alleged that the British company d 1 Oil India Pvt Ltd and its employee Sunil Puri, are involved in the theft. The university administration has filed an fir against Puri, but hasn't taken any action against d1.

Puri, a former head of department of forestry (dof) in igau, was assigned two projects on jatropha in 2002-2003. The studies found that Chhattisgarh's Pendra and Surguja regions had high yielding variety of the plant. This caught the attention of d1, which Puri later joined as technical director. Following this, he was suspended from the university. And soon after, the theft of jatropha germplasm was reported.

The state government set up an enquiry commission to look into the matter. On December 8, 2005, the enquiry committee accompanied by the police raided Puri's house and seized seeds of 43 accessions of jatropha germplasm. Another raid at the research farm of d1 in Panchdeori village, about 25 km from Raipur, yielded 1,540 plants of 28 accessions. All the plants seized had the accession and tag numbers of igau . But no records of their being moved out were found with igau .

Sanket Thakur, member, board of management, igau, brought the incident to the chief minister's notice, and it was only then that the university lodged the fir. Thakur alleged that vice-chancellor C R Hazra was also involved. "Hazra did not even discuss the issue in the board meeting of igau ," he said.

Meanwhile, managing director of d1, Sarju Singh, said that in September, 2005, he had met Hazra and claimed that the jatropha germplasm was brought to them for study, in safe custody of igau officers. Hazra has denied that he or igau had "any relations" with d1. He blamed Puri for cheating him and the university.

In all the commotion, the seized plants have been left to die. Though they have been taken back to the university, they have not been replanted since the case is under investigation.

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