The Rajya Sabha on Tuesday passed the Biological Diversity (Amendment) Bill 2021, a week after it was cleared in the Lok Sabha. The Bill aims to amend the Biological Diversity Act, 2002, and was drafted in response to complaints by traditional Indian medicine practitioners, the seed sector, industry and researchers that the Act imposed a heavy “compliance burden” and made it hard to conduct collaborative research and investments and simplify patent application processes.
The text of the Bill also said that it proposes to “widen the scope of levying access and benefit sharing with local communities and for further conservation of biological resources.” The Bill also proposes to decriminalising offences under the Act and substituting them with penalties (between ₹1 lakh and ₹50 lakh and continuing violations can attract an additional penalty of up to ₹1 crore) and no imprisonment.
While several members spoke on various aspects of the Bill, no member expressed serious dissent on its clauses. Most of the members, while supporting the Bill, said that the Bill ought to ensure that India’s biodiversity not be dominated by “corporate” interests, and that economic benefit that resulted from harnessing biological products from forests be “equitably” shared.
Environment Minister, Bhupendra Yadav, in his reply said that “…the Bill had been presented to a Joint Parliementary Committee who has analysed all its provisions threadbare and given very useful suggestions. We want to promote Ayurveda and Ayush (Ayurveda, Yoga, Unani, Siddha and Homeopathy) and simplify and streamline the patent application process (for patents on biological products) so that local communities can benefit. This will also attract more investment in research and commercialisation of our products while protecting traditional knowledge,” he added.
Congress spokesperson and Rajya Sabha member, Jairam Ramesh, posted on X that the Bill had been passed “without any meaningful debate” and that the passing of the amendments was an example of how ‘ease of doing business” had taken precedence over “protection, preservation and regeneration.”
