The Supreme Court on Friday sought a response from the Centre on a PIL seeking direction to strike down governments notification allowing manufacture and import of genetically modified (GM) crops without passing through the mandatory tests.

The government, on September 11 2007, had issued a notification which exempted GM food substances from mandatory approval of the Genetic Engineering Approval Committee (GEAC). A Bench headed by chief Justice K G Balakrishnan issued the notice to the Centre and asked it to file a response by February 19. The petition filed by environment scientist Vandana Shiva pointed out that despite the provisions of law, which said proper sanction of the authority was required before sale, import and production of GM crops, the government had illegally granted a blanket exemption.

PTI