The doyen of agriculture

This refers to ‘The agri revolutionary’ (September 29). From living on imported wheat from the US till 1965 to becoming self-reliant now, all credit goes to the Father of India’s Green Revolution, MS Swaminathan. He relentlessly pursued to increase the yield for our poor farmers. It is on his insistence former Prime Minister Lal Bahadur Shastri invited Nobel Peace Prize winner Norman Borlaug to India to share seeds of dwarf wheat to maximise yield. Besides focusing on sustainable livelihood, MSS also encouraged women to participate in agriculture. And it was he who floated the idea of a biotechnology park for women. Indeed, he should have been conferred the Bharat Ratna when he was alive. None the less, he should be given the award posthumously.

Bal Govind

Noida

Birth certificate

Effective October 1, birth certificate will become a crucial document for various purposes including applying for Aadhaar card, admission to educational institutions, and marriage registration.

Citizens could encounter problems here. In the case of senior citizens, the certificate would have been issued many decades ago. Then they were all handwritten. There could also be no records at the issuers’ end. The situation could be more onerous in rural areas. Given the governance standards at local government institutions, both urban and rural, correcting these will prove tedious or even impossible. The legislation could put in place a system for new, corrected, computer generated birth certificates.

V Vijaykumar

Pune

Missing pavements

This refers to “The enigma of Indian roads” (September 28). In a city like Pune it is a common to see two-wheelers run on pavements when the roads are chock-a-block with traffic. In the process, pedestrians find it difficult to locate walking space on busy roads. Encroachment of pavements by hawker adds to the problem. The police and local bodies often turn a blind eye to these incursions.

YG Chouksey

Pune

SME trading platform

This refers to ‘No small matter’(September 29). The small trading platforms created by stock exchanges to facilitate SMEs did not attract investors initially. Of late, however, trading in these stocks has improved due to their low price, minimum subscription norms and diversion of huge amounts of investible funds to make substantial listing gains.

Though it may not warrant the regulator to vet the offer documents of small entity IPOs, the stock exchanges should increase their monitoring, surveillance and controlling mechanism, to curb the excessive levels of speculation activity in these stocks.

Sitaram Popuri

Bengaluru

Tackling diabetes

This is with reference to ‘Global shortage of diabetes drug could impact India’ (September 29). Diabetes, which earlier was considered a rich man’s disease, has become common. Hence shortage of diabetes drugs should be addressed and made available at reasonable rates.

The increase in the number of diabetic patients is largely due to unhealthy lifestyles that involve eating processed food, consumption of aerated drinks, lack of exercise, adopting Western food habits, etc. Educating people/children about healthy eating habits, exercise and yoga can help bring the problem under control.

Veena Shenoy

Thane

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