Commondreams.org, By: Sarah Lazare, 08/09/2013
Thousands of farmers and their allies gathered in New Delhi from 20 states across India on Thursday to demand that multinational corporations that make genetically modified organisms (GMOs) 'Quit India.' The reference to India's historic 'Quit India' civil disobedience movements for independence from Britain charged the thousands-strong day-long sit-in at Jantar Mantar in New Delhi, followed by a large march to parliament demanding an end to dependence on GMO corporations.
Protesters handed an Indian flag made of organic, non-GMO cotton to Prime Minister Manmohan Singh Thursday to protest a new Biotech Regulatory Authority of India (BRAI) bill to fast-track GMO clearance in a country already dominated by GMO corporate giants. "We request the PM to hoist an organic, Indian cotton flag because it will be symbolic of seed sovereignty," declared Pankaj Bhushan, co-convener of GM-Free India Coalition, urging the prime minister not to fly the flag of U.S. multinationals that corner 93 percent of the country's cotton seed industry.
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