Cancer in Malwa: A growing Menace

A visit by the Parliamentary Standing Committee on Agriculture to Bathinda areas, particularly Jajjal village, has stirred high emotions among Malwa residents and activists raising their voice against cancer — a disease estimated to afflict 120-125 persons per lakh in the area, against the national average of 71. These figures are disputed, as are the causes of the disease, as neither the state government nor the Centre have had any comprehensive study conducted on the subject. This gives rise to the suspicion the state government wants to hide the reasons, as those could be considered failings on its part — such as unscientific use of pesticides by farmers and inability to supply clean drinking water. Such allegations were levelled by some of the locals during the House panel’s visit. Various agencies have examined limited aspects of the issue and pointed at nitrates, uranium and pesticides in the water as culprits. However, none has offered a definitive cause, which provides the governments with a fig leaf to delay concrete action.

The immediate concern of the people is cancer treatment, which is hard to come by in Malwa. A few government treatment centres have been set up, but have failed to win people’s trust, who continue to go to Rajasthan for the purpose. A couple of large private cancer hospitals are also being set up on public land to provide low-cost treatment to the poor. But such charity arrangements have rarely worked in the past. This is one sector where the Centre will have to put in money. After all, Punjab has fed the country; its farmers are now in need of help.
One thing the state government has to work on is the prevention of cancer. While fundamental corrections such as cleaning up the state’s waters would take a while, the government has to ensure it starts providing filtered water to all affected areas immediately. Reverse osmosis is a technology found effective in filtering out most of the harmful elements. As it is expensive, the Centre needs to step in here too. No cost should be considered too much. People are dying.