"Only Kasargod district is affected because the Kerala government in 1998 indiscriminately sprayed endosulfan on 10,000 acres of cashewnut plantations. The Karnataka government has written to the Centre that some parts of the state neighbouring areas of Kasargod have been affected. If anything is used indiscriminately, you are bound to have side-effects. Nobody is talking about culpability of Kerala government, but everybody is saying `ban endosulfan','' Ramesh told TOI.
The minister said he had not come across any such cases of side-effects from West Bengal, Punjab and Orissa, who are the largest users of endosulfan. "Give me the epidemiological study. If people are dying of cancer or born with some retardation, you cannot ascribe all that to endosulfan. Neither Kerala nor Karnataka has done an epidemiological study," Ramesh said. Read the full report here.
Source: Anil Kumar M, TNN, Bangalore.
