What’s the difference between Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru and Prime Minister Manmohan Singh? This query is not about their politics. It’s about their food.

Pandit Nehru didn’t have to worry about the food he was eating. It was 100% safe. Agricultural experts began to recommend the use of poisonous chemicals in agriculture from 1966 onwards when the new seeds they introduced and the new methods of agriculture began to create large scale insect attacks.

Today neither Prime Minister Manmohan Singh nor even President Pratibha Patil have access to guaranteed pesticide-free food. However high and mighty, they share the same fate as the bulk of 1.4 billion Indians (mostly those residing in cities and towns) who have to consume food that is laced with more than 120 dangerous chemicals of every conceivable kind.

That leads to my next query:

Ever wonder why nowadays you find poison plots (where someone is given poisoned food and dies) only in movies of pre-modern periods? Because with today’s unenviable situation, having poison in your food is the normal thing! If you tell any agricultural scientist that he should advise farmers to grow food without the use of these deadly chemicals, he will think you are abnormal.

In fact, people are willing to accept any idea or practice, howsoever illogical, so long as it carries the stamp of “science”. I never thought the world would one day accept without question that food and poison can go together and that we will remain healthy nonetheless.

Fairly soon, if the Government approves the proposal, the 3500 varieties of brinjal this country produces will be reduced to one variety, Bt brinjal, since the Bt gene will become common to all the varieties either through commerce or by natural pollination. Citizens oppose engineered food because the engineering turns the entire plant (root, stem, leaves, fruit) into a toxin producing factory, with each cell producing the toxic Bt gene.

However, we are already squarely in a situation in which we are consuming (without knowing) entire vegetables and fruits that are fully contaminated by poisons. This has happened over the space of only the past three decades. The amount of poison already in our food is increasing and getting more and more lethal.

Scientists claim they recommend poisons to protect crops and therefore farmers’ livelihoods. However, farmers often use them for other reasons too, one of them being to make their products look good for the market.

You think that good food must look good: the vegetables and fruits should glisten and shine, or be brightly coloured and without any holes or blemish of any kind. Appearances are quite deceptive. The more beautiful the vegetable looks, the greater the chances it has been doused in chemicals. In Chennai general markets, cabbages are in fact doused in 200 litre drums of pesticides which causes them to shine. On grape farms in Maharashtra, grape bunches harvested from the vines are dipped into cans of deadly poisons. Chances are the mango or banana you just ate was artifically ripened by using calcium carbide, which is a known carcinogen.

Ironically, mothers make their children eat lots of veggies and fruits because these foods are considered extremely good for health in contrast with meats. They also are natural stores of vitamins and minerals. What would be the effect of feeding your kids with veggies and fruits actually contaminated with nerve poisons? Don’t you at least have the right to know? Yet no system of ready consumer information on this most critical area exists.

This is not to say some people are not getting safe food. In those areas where these poisons have not yet reached, or in fields were people are into organic ways of growing food, food is still safe and nutritious, but in large cities it is laced literally with hell.

So let’s introduce you to my favourite version of the Dirty Dozen and give you crystal clear reasons why you should avoid each of them like the plague. I’m not joking. I know that many on the list are basic, in some cases even indispensable, to cooking. But you need to know the gravity of the situation. The purpose of putting up this list of the country’s Dirty Dozen is not to create a feeling of helplessness, but to ensure you are informed so that you can develop the skill of avoiding the chemically treated ones that will undo your good health.

Only if you can get a guaranteed supply of these veggies and fruits from organic farms which do not use pesticides by law should you eat them. So go out of your way to ensure this. Better to spend some more time looking for nourishing food than simply picking off stuff from supermarket shelves. Also, better to spend a little more buying safer stuff or, if there is no alternative, buying and consuming less of the danger item. If you are determined to protect your health, then simply find alternatives to these regular items.

If you ignore these warnings, you will keep accumulating toxins in the body. One day these toxins will exact their price, for they are not supposed to be residing in your body. How could they? Many of these poisons were created just a few decades ago. On the other hand, your body is a work of art put together by nature over slow trial and error over thousands of years. Don’t ruin it by not knowing.
Vegetables:

1) Cabbage: This common vegetable could turn you into a vegetable and you wouldn’t know when and why. The variety most susceptible is the Pride of India variety, sold largely in markets in north India. To achieve an instant shine, farmers dip their cabbages in a carbofuran (furadon) dip to give it a greenish blue shine. The glistening effect remains for several days. The scientific literature handed out by the companies who produce it warns that any produce on which carbofuran is used should not be consumed for minimum 28 days. Our farmers and traders harvest the cabbages, dip and sell the same day. Imagine eating such cabbage raw, as salad, a practice in most restaurants.
All that glitters is not gold.

If you are addicted to cabbage, choose other varieties and preferably buy those which are dark green and without a sheen. They may even look muddy. Just throw away the top leaves. Nature does not produce shiny, glistening, greenish blue cabbages.

2) Cauliflower: Another popular vegetable, one which some people eat almost everyday. The harvested flower attracts the semi-looper worm and a dozen other catepillars. These lay eggs and multiply, causing havoc especially during transport. City folk hate to see caterpillars in their cauliflower. So traders treat the cauliflower with endosulphan. Veggies treated with endosulphan should not be eaten for 14 days. However, like the cabbages, the cauliflowers are sprayed and sold, sometimes on the same day itself, certainly within the week.

To prevent the tiny black spots that affect cauliflower, farmers use fungicides like bavistene. The small fine black dots are actually not harmful to health. But since consumers want a resplendent white cauliflower (no matter what it looks like after it has been cooked), the farmer is ever ready to oblige. Why should it matter to him? He’s not going to eat that cauliflower anyway!

3) Tomatoes: This common, popular vegetable is often eaten raw. It is subject to damage from the fruit borer family, as in the case of brinjal. Since both tomato and brinjal have shiny skins, external application of pesticide may not be effective. Farmers are therefore advised by pesticide companies to use what are called “systemic insecticides”. In fact, most companies are now largely promoting systemic pesticides. These poisons enter the entire plant through the stomata, contaminating the tomato from within. No amount of washing of the vegetable will get rid of the poison.

The poisons very commonly used are called organophosphates. One graphic study from the United States (which taught the world this practice of using deadly poisons on food) showed that children of farmers who used these poisons had smaller brains and were slow learners compared to those not exposed. Organophosphates are neural poisons.

4) Brinjals: Another very common vegetable which is subject to caterpillar and fruit borer attack. Spraying of pesticides is done especially at harvest time, especially on large farms.

My friend Miguel Braganza (who is a trained agricultural scientist) told me how these nerve poisons were first used. In fact, he says, they were introduced during World War II to get at tank commanders because at that time depleted uranium shells were which could penetrate tank metal and get at the people inside were not yet developed. So cannisters of these nerve poisons were dropped into the tanks, disorienting the commanders and forcing them to emerge in the open.

It is these same poisons – first designed to knock out human beings in war zones – that are now routinely used against insects feeding on tomatoes and brinjal.

So if you have to buy brinjal, look for mandis where the seller stocks different varieties, rather than only one or two. This would indicate a diverse supply coming from small farms.

5) Greens: Tragically, quick growing greens like spinach (palak), pudina, curry leaf (karipatta) are also now regularly sprayed with chemicals, one more poisonous than the next. (Sometimes farmers mix different pesticide formulations together to get a stronger “cocktail”.) Spinach is sprayed once a week to ensure that insects do not chew up some of the leaves which induces the customer to reject the whole bundle. Monoculture plantations of curry leaf are also sprayed. Those coming from non-commercial, household gardens will not be sprayed because the farmer will also be consuming these in his own house.

The important thing to note about greens is that they are so easy to grow in your own home, on the terrace, in the garden. I know of several individuals in Mumbai, Pune, even Visakapatnam and Kolkata who have kitchen gardens on building terraces. Chili, okra (bhendi), pudina, curry leaf should be grown at home by everyone. Drop the number of crotons and rose bushes. Put in vegetable plants including brinjal and tomato among your garden plants.

6) Potato: The potato grows underground and is subject to root grub and potato beetle attacks. Systemic poisons like organochlorines are applied to the soil so that they can penetrate the potato and harm their pests.

During storage, potatoes are also subject to attacks from weevils which can make undesirable and ungainly looking holes. Thirty years ago, dangerous bromides like aluminium phosphide were used. These are now prohibited by law except to registered government agencies. Fumigants are now used in their place. These come in the form of tablets which when dissolved in water release a toxic gas. Government has a Minister for Home to protect us from murderers and terrorists, but no person has been appointed to ensure that we are not killed by these poisons!

Fruits:

7) Grapes: These are so obviously contaminated with poisons that some parents I know have banned grape consumption in their homes. Last year when I consumed a few, I developed a very rough throat rightaway. The pesticides used, besides others, are again organophaphates, some with brand names like nuvacron and monocrotophos. The use of these pesticides is generally after the grapes are harvested. The pesticides are introduced into drums or cans and the grapes are doused in the liquid. Since these poisons are volatile, the smell disappears in a few days without a trace. But the poison remains. Since it is systemic, washing is of no consequence except for removing any dirt or soil, which by the way is not toxic in any way.

8) Mangoes: Endosulphan is sprayed on mangoes ten days before harvesting to get rid of the fruit fly which can damage the mangoes after they are plucked. The mango itself may be free of the poison. However since mangoes are now mass produced and are being transported great distances, they are often plucked before they are seasoned and then quickly ripened by using ethylene gas. Ethylene gas is not harmful in itself. In fact, it is released naturally by the mango from the seed outwards as it ripens. But subjecting the fruit to this gas externally, ripens the mango fruit from the skin inwards. Thus the skin looks a golden yellow, but the fruit is likely to be sour.

The dangerous fruit ripening agent which is also used is calcium carbide because it is usually is contaminated with arsenic. And that is real poison no one wants inside their bodies. Every year the media carries news reports of godowns being raided and mangoes being confiscated and destroyed because the trader has used calcium carbide. Good riddance.

9) Bananas: One always thought the banana to be a safe item because its skin is discarded. However, this common breakfast or post-lunch fruit undergoes the forced penalty of artificial enlargement and ripening. I have seen farmers using pouches of 2-4-D or 2-4-5-T where the flower has been cut off. The banana bunch absorbs the poison, which mimics indol acetic acid and stimulates cell elongation (therefore a bigger bunch). 2-4-D is the chemical used by the Americans in the defoliation of Vietnam during the war.

The other chemical used for ripening in banana godowns is etheral solution or ethephone which releases ethylene gas. Normally, the gas should not be released direct on the fruit. It is released in a closed chamber in which the fruits are kept. However, as a short cut, traders simply dip the bunches in etheral solution.

10) Apples:

Lethal pesticides were not used earlier on apples. In 1983, there was a large scale attack of mealybugs in Himachal Pradesh. The government issued an order listing 29 different chemicals that could be applied to apples. The attack disappeared, but the government order has not been withdrawn. Some of these chemicals are contact poisons, others are systemic. Apple farmers now routinely apply at least 12 chemical sprays. Since systemic pesticides are being used, skinning the apple before eating is no protection. The old adage, “An apple a day keeps the doctor away,” no longer holds true since it is hard to find non-toxic apples ever since apple-growing became large-scale and commercial. Now an apple a day may be an invitation to see the doctor. The impact of poisons is never immediate, but the toll comes, sooner rather than later. Mostly it discloses itself in general illhealth and propensity to illness with one never knowing the cause.

11) Poultry: Once upon a time, a chicken would take about a year to reach a kilo in weight. With “battery farming” and a constant diet of artificial hormones, that period was shortened to 9 weeks. Now it takes 5 weeks.

The growth hormones used are estrogen-progesterone. Young girls regularly consuming such chicken raised in this manner may experience puberty earlier than usual or face possible damage to their follicles or polycystic ovaries.

Poultry farmers also feed the birds a variety of antibiotics and vaccines in the food or in the water the birds drink. One does not know whether to pity the chickens that are raised this way or the people who will consume them. Either way, the scenario is quite depressing. If you cannot find naturally raised country chicken but still want to have chicken, reduce its intake drastically.

12) Tea: The favourite drink of millions was once the safest way of having hot water. However, the entry of a large number of new actors growing tea in unlikely places and in unsound ways has brought in huge imbalances in insect populations. The European Union last year introduced regulations to impose strict limits for approximately 134 pesticides now routinely used on tea bushes. These include DDT. If you go to the Tea Board website, you can get an inkling of the number of pesticides that the Board officially recommends for use by tea gardeners. It’s enough to choke on your morning cuppa.

What is Generally Safer to Eat:

Cereals and veggies:

1) Millets: Of all the cereals available which are absolutely without pesticides or any other undesirable chemical inputs, millets are mostly sound food. Switch to a porridge of millets. You’ll not only protect yourself from poisons, you’ll be in far better health because millets are nutritionally more complete than the normal wheat or rice (which will have chemical residues).

2) Root crops: The root crops of radish (mooli), carrot (gajar) and beetroot are generally safe as they are not grown on as large a scale as potato. These are also hardy crops, thankfully not requiring regular doses of pesticide.

3) Yams are also a safe source of good and nutritious food. No farmer I know uses chemicals for such crops. The same cannot be said of tapioca which is now regularly sprayed because of insect attacks.

4) Coconut: The coconut is a perfect food. The flesh is filled with vitamins and minerals. The water is 100% naturally sterile (it has in fact been used in place of glucose for intravenous in emergencies) and its pH is alkaline. It can therefore be used in place of milk in case you want to neutralize a very acidic stomach. Some pesticides are used to get rid of beetles which attack coconut trees, but these will never get into the fruit in any case.

5) Gourds: The entire range of vegetables from the family of curcubits is not generally sprayed, except for cucumber. Most of the hard skinned ones including bottle-gourd, ridge gourd, snake gourd and pumpkin are safe to eat because they are produced in kitchen gardens where there is simply no tradition of using expensive, dangerous chemicals.

Fruits:

Pineapple is one of the safest of fruits to consume. This is not to say that pineapple plantations are not sprayed. However, the spraying is carried out at the stage of flowering which is around two and a half months before the fruit will eventually mature and be ready for eating. The effect of the sprays will not exceed 15 days. The pineapple also has a thick skin which in any case has to be removed before consumption.

Papaya is also a safe food. The problems it faces cannot be really solved by the existing brand of chemicals. If you get local varieties of papaya (with seed), these are absolutely safe, having been grown in homesteads or home gardens. The more uniform the shape of the papaya, the surer you are it has come from a large plantation, in which case there will always be a suspicion that chemicals have been used. The more misshapen or unique the shape, the better the guarantee that you are having one of nature’s best offerings.

Chickoos or sapotas are also in my category of safe fruit. In any case, chickoo plants face problems like attacks from bats for which chemical sprays are of no use.

The other fruits that remain generally safe include pomegranates, oranges and sweet limes where very little chemicals are used. And of course, there are fruits like the jackfruit, which are absolutely delicious and for which no chemicals are used at all.

Count your blessings then because our agricultural scientists and the pesticide companies have not succeeded as yet in ruining everything. Your best choice, however, is to find food grown on an organic farm where regulations do not permit the use of either chemical fertilizers or poisonous pesticides or genetically engineered seeds. (For a complete all-India list of organic food stores, visit www.ofai.org/)

Claude Alvares

(To be published in Prevention Magazine, New Delhi)