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It seems that, throughout history, there has never been justice or equality. Instead there has been exploitation of the weak and poor by the strong and rich. Look at the "Barra Sahib" with his whip! I did'nt realize until now that the rules for opium trade were different from those forthe indigo trade.

It also seems that monoculture was the English gift to India. Opium, Indigo, Teak.... Unfortunately, the monoculture mindset still persists.

That has been a universal practice with all imperial powers e.g. Sugarcane in Mauritius not to mention various banana republics. Marlon Brando plays a memorable Mr. Walker in "Quemada" ("The Burnt") which is a story of one such country totally destroyed by the imperial power.

Quemada was one of my favorite movies. Don't forget tea, coffee and cocoa as monoculture. Jatropa is on its way to become one.

"Rice is particularly important in India, where 200,000 rice varieties existed before the “Green Revolution” brought intensive monocultures and pesticides. In several of her books, including The violence of the Green Revolution and Monocultures of the Mind, Vandana Shiva described how the “reductionist paradigm”of the Green Revolution perpetrated violence to the Earth as well as to women and children." We carry on with the imperial mindset. It is embedded in modern thinking.The fruits of 5 centuries of political , economic and intellectual colonisation. http://www.ecoworld.com/nature/fighting-monocultures-of-the-mind.html

At the same time we need to produce enough grains to feed the teeming and burgeoning millions. It is sad that the wheat and rice rots and the milk in plenty is profusely adulterated. We ourselves are to be blamed for the imperialist mindset. What is there to stop us from doing what is right for us?

Sunny : 200,000 rice varieties !! Inconceivable for my mind....wonder how many exist now??

Prosperity conflicts with ruthless application of science and markets to human problems especially in the developing countries. I wonder why we (children of the middle-classes who benefited the most from the the industrial and green revolutions) romanticise and identify with the image of a poor woman with her goat and child or the image of an adivasi with a bow and arrow. What is our idea of progress and liberation for the bottom wrung of the society? How do we deliver the same prosperity as we enjoy to them? If we define prosperity differently for them, we must leave our intellectual and material environ and join ranks with them and fight shoulder to shoulder by organising their resistance. We can't keep enjoying best of both worlds. The romantic one and the material one. As long as we produce for the market, our destiny is linked to what markets demand. To change that, we need to change the idea of prosperity and freedom, knowledge and empowerment.

"To change that , we need to change the idea of prosperity and freedom , knowledge and empowerment" - In this age of mobile and satellite communication, 600 mobile phones and Dish TV, there is very little of that "romantic " left anyways. So a new consensus will have to emerge , of what is development and how it happens. Global warming , water crisis and financial and structural collapse of the economic trading systems - we are right in middle of it .

Indigo crops are being grown with much profit in Bangladesh. The leaves sell for the famous dye and the stems as firewood. Grown alongside rice it gives liquid-cash to the farmers . And it has led to a beautiful natural- indigo based textile village industry employing more than a thousand embroiderers, weavers, spinners,dyers using the most advanced Shibori tye-dye techniques along with traditional quilt making using patchwork. http://www.thedailystar.net/newDesign/news-details.php?nid=156960

" If we define prosperity differently for them, we must leave our intellectual and material environ and join ranks with them and fight shoulder to shoulder by organising their resistance. We can't keep enjoying best of both worlds. The romantic one and the material one." Which is why I say hats off to the likes of Bunker Roy , Ravi J. Matthai ( in his last years ) ...and to stretch a point ..even Kobad Ghandy !

@Jacob Thomas: Just what I had in mind, in so few a words. Brilliant.

Thank you Shekhar ,,though it 's hardly very 'brilliant' on my part. Just my natural laziness to think things through far more ..and come up with the right words - like you have ! All these persons had the courage of their convictions ,,and in the face of terrible hardship and privation ..unfliinchingly stayed the course . Mine is but 'armchair admiration ' at best !