"This Ministry has no information on whether M/s Monsanto is luring parliamentarians to foreign countries on the pretext of study tours," Environment Minister Prakash Javadekar said in a written reply.
Stating that the government has not overruled the recommendations of Genetically Engineering Appraisal Committee (GEAC), he said the bio-tech regulator has recently approved 12 GM crops' experimental field trials for the purpose of generating bio-safety data including brinjal and rice subject after submission of NOC from the concerned state governments.
"All field trials are subjected to stringent norms such as maintaining a crop specific isolation distance from the periphery of the experimental site; biological barrier, submission of a validated event specific test protocol and post-harvest restrictions," the Minister said.