Monsanto commits patent fraud: Govt to High Court

Hyderabad: The Telangana State government asserted before the High Court at Hyderabad on Tuesday that it was interested in providing BT cotton seeds to farmers at low price. It charged that its intention was being thwarted by the MNC Company, Monsanto, and its Indian partner Mahico Monsanto. They were indulging in the pricing game.

Telangana State special counsel C S Vaidyanathan alleged that Monsanto was committing a patent fraud on farmers by raising the prices of its product exorbitantly. Vaidyanathan made this submission to a division bench comprising Acting Chief Justice Dilip B Bhosale and Justice P Naveen Rao. The division was hearing the State’s appeal to vacate the stay order given by a single judge on the operation of the G.O. that sought to control the MNC from charging huge amounts of royalty on the price of a pack of BT Cotton seeds.

He contended that the stay order and other litigation being launched by the companies was coming in the way of the efforts of the State to save the farmers from the exorbitant prices of cotton seeds of the company. Using the stay order, Monsanto was now even forcing the seed companies to pay more money to them, said Vaidyanathan. The Monsanto was collecting a price of Rs 2,200 per pack of BT seeds. In this the price of the seed was only Rs 400, whereas the royalty or trait value was a whopping Rs1,800.

Senior counsel C V Mohan Reddy, who appeared for Monsanto, told the bench that it was strange that the Telangana State counsel was espousing the cause of seed companies through his pleadings. He expressed a doubt whether the seed companies were behind this writ appeal filed by Telangana State.

He pointed out that the Central government was set to announce a maximum sale price for these seeds soon and it may settle the matters. The bench too expressed the opinion that it may be better to wait till the Centre came out with fixing the price and posted the case to March 22.