Commentary/Dilip D'Souza
The Time Has Come, The Walrus Said, To Talk Of Turmeric And Queens
What, you never wondered, is common to haldi and Queen Elizabeth? Very
little, you think, getting ready to laugh at me. As well you should, for
look at that: I've had the temerity to mention haldi in the same sentence
as the Queen! And that's an offence for which, I understand, "Off with his
head!" used to be considered the rigor, or do I mean de rigueur.
Times have changed since. In 1997, all they have in common is that both
have done time at the centre of raging new touchstones of Indian honour.
First, we are sure we won a stirring victory over evil Americans intent on
patenting turmeric. Now we want to make the Queen grovel when she visits
us, force her to apologise for the Jallianwalla Bagh massacre.
Say I'm a nut if you like. But where the honour is in either of these
things, I'm hard pressed to divine.
Take the haldi first. Ah yes, those pasty-faced Americans, up to their
scummy tricks again! How dare they try to steal our foremothers's knowledge,
try to make us pay for our own wisdom? But we showed them, didn't we? We
fought off those greedy punks, defeated that patent application, won a huge
victory for India. Drum roll, please.
Except that the facts -- those miserably inconvenient things -- tell a
somewhat different story.
First, the patent application in question was not for the haldi spice, or
the plant. To start with, you simply cannot patent an ordinary plant in the
USA. Yes, you can patent a strain of a plant that you have researched and
produced. You can also patent some new use you have discovered for a plant,
providing, of course, it has not already been discovered by someone else.
But US and international laws do not allow patents on plants that grow
naturally. That's that.
This patent application was made by the University of Mississippi's Medical
Centre. They believed they had discovered a way to heal wounds using haldi
powder. Far from applying for a patent on the plant itself, UMMC applied
for a patent on this medicinal use. Now in India, we have been using haldi
powder to treat wounds for generations. This is what a team of scientists
from the Council of Scientific & Industrial Research proved to the
US Patents & Trademarks Office. Which Office then dismissed -- after a
year-long legal battle, yes -- UMMC's patent application. End of story.
Second, there's no conceivable way -- unless you are incurably afflicted
with jingoism -- that this can be seen as a victory for India over those
pimply Yanks. Yes, Indian scientists provided the grounds for the dismissal
of the patent application and they deserve congratulations for doing so.
But as Swaminathan Anklesaria Aiyar explained in a recent column, all that
happened was that an American authority prevented an American organisation
from charging American consumers for the use of haldi in this particular
way. In fact, the decision affirms that American patent laws do not allow
our traditional knowledge to be stolen from us. Nor did the decision act to
protect that knowledge. It remains as it always was, as it should be: free
and available for use by anyone in the world.
Third, even if that patent had been granted, it's still a lie to say that
Indians would have had to pay for our traditional use of haldi. Companies
wanting to sell the wound-healing medicine would need to pay UMMC, who
patented the medicine, for that privilege. That's all. There's no
conceivable way the patent could have stopped you and me from continuing to
use haldi as we always have. So we can't claim a victory there either. Of
course, once we showed we have known of haldi's powers for generations,
there's no way that patent could have been approved anyway. Which, of
course, is what happened.
But instead of seeing this, as Aiyar does, as a victory for common sense,
we think India has won a huge war. We've gone into chest-puffing overdrive.
Take that, Uncle Sam!
Which makes Queen Elizabeth's impending visit to India quite perfectly
timed. In this mood of pumped-up machismo, what could be better than
forcing the Queen to apologise for Jallianwalla Bagh? We made the Yanks
kneel, now let's do the same to the Poms!
But what's this? Our prime minister has actually been telling the Queen
there's no need to apologise? What weak-kneed effrontery! It moved one
indignant columnist to splutter on this corner of the Web some days ago: "I
used to think it was part of the job description of a prime minister to
pursue his country's interests!" So why is that snivelling wimp Gujral
undermining our interests, snuffing out this demand for an apology?
Now I have no idea what motivated Gujral, nor do I particularly care. But
allow me to offer you some implications of demanding a royal apology for
Jallianwalla Bagh. All off the top of my head.
After watching the Queen apologise in Amritsar for Jallianwalla Bagh, might
Sikhs be moved to demand an apology from the Indian State? That, for the
attack on their holiest shrine, only minutes from Jallianwalla Bagh,
followed by the horrific massacre of over 3,000 Sikhs, all in 1984. Might
Muslims demand an apology? That one, for the demolition of the Babri Masjid
and the subsequent riots in which the majority killed were Muslim. Might
lower castes demand an apology, for centuries of the vilest kind of
oppression? Might tribals demand an apology, for endless policies and
attitudes that have left them increasingly destitute? For the deliberate
neglect of their health care that allows ordinary measles and diarrhoea to
kill their children by the thousand every year?
You know I could continue this list indefinitely. You may not agree with
some of these reasons for apologies, but in every case there are people who
believe grievous wrong has been committed. Just as you and I believe there
was grievous wrong committed at Jallianwalla Bagh in 1919. The point is,
there are innumerable reasons for apologies. The point also is, very few of
us in this world are on moral ground unassailably high enough to demand
apologies, without triggering off other demands for apologies.
It's just possible Gujral had some of all this in mind. Wary of the swampy
minefield he would be stepping into, perhaps he decided to discourage the
queen from apologising at all. I don't know.
Frankly, I don't much care if the lady apologises or not: if she chooses to,
that's perfectly all right by me. It would be a gracious gesture. And I
fully agree that prime ministers must pursue the national interest and must
be ridiculed when they do not.
So those who want the queen to say sorry are welcome to shout about it. But
when they say it is in the country's interest to shout about it, they just
sidetrack the real, the only national interest: the welfare of our people,
period. I cannot see how demanding that apology from the queen is equated
to that welfare, to the national interest. Nor can I see how her apology
will, in any sense, be a triumph for India. Why it has become a measure of
Indian prestige.
As an Indian, you will stand not an inch taller if you have Queen Liz
grovelling at your feet.
Except, again, if you're incurably afflicted with that dread disease:
jingoism. You will still not stand taller, but you might think you do. I'm
here to tell you there's a cure for this disease. It uses haldi powder.
Check with the queen of England, she's applying for a patent on it.
EARLIER FEATURES ON THE TURMERIC TRIUMPH:
Pepsi and turmeric symbolise a self-inflicted Indian dilemma
The battle of haldiis over; the war lies ahead
How the legal war was won
Major victory for India as US refuses to patent turmeric
EXTERNAL LINK:
Indian Spices
EARLIER FEATURES ON THE JALLIANWALLA BAGH CONTROVERSY:
Will Queen Elizabeth say sorry for Jallianwala Bagh?
'Let Jallianwala Bagh be a symbol'
Remorseful British accounts in the Jallianwala Bagh visitors book
'The queen's visit eventually is just an empty gesture'
'Why just Jallianwala, if the queen apologises it should be for all crimes perpetrated under the Union Jack'
EXTERNAL LINK:
The Making of the Hybrid Raj, 1700-1857
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