Share your story and shine at JK Monitor!🌟 Welcome to JK Monitor, where every story matters and every achievement is celebrated! We invite you to share the remarkable journey of your life and showcase your accomplishments to the world. Join our exclusive interviews that honor exceptional individuals just like you. JAMMU: Anuj Kumar Verma, the noted Environmental Advocate and Policy Writer of Jammu and Kashmir said that yesterday, in the Jammu and Kashmir Legislative Assembly, Health and Medical Education Minister Sakina Itoo informed the House that the Union Territory currently has around 51,000 registered cancer patients. She added that the government has set up two State Cancer Institutes and is expanding screening and treatment services across J&K.
While the Minister’s reply focused on the overall caseload, national cancer registry data and local oncologists have long highlighted a heavy burden of gastro‑intestinal, lung and breast cancers in the region, consistent with the pattern described by civil society and medical observers. At the same time, unconfirmed reports from hospitals and field workers suggest the actual number of people living with cancer may be closer to 71,000; this higher figure, however, does not yet appear in any official UT or national dataset and should be treated as an estimate pending formal verification.
This stark revelation should serve as a wake‑up call for every elected representative, for it is no longer possible to ignore the alarming correlation between this life‑consuming disease and the dangerously high usage of hazardous agrochemicals in our orchards and fields. Recent peer‑reviewed analysis of official agriculture data (Ministry of Agriculture & Farmers’ Welfare/CIPHET and state directorates) shows that Jammu and Kashmir now uses about 3.69 kg of chemical pesticide per hectare of gross cropped area, the highest in India. By comparison, Punjab and Haryana record roughly 0.62–0.68 kg/ha, Himachal Pradesh about 0.50 kg/ha, and the national average around 0.22–0.29 kg/ha, depending on the year and whether gross or net cropped area is used.
It is high time our honourable legislators seriously ponder whether this chemical onslaught is directly or indirectly fueling not only the surge in cancer but also the rising tide of chronic kidney disease, brain tumours, neurological disorders and gastric ailments among our people, especially farm workers and their families, while pesticide residues and heavy metals contaminate our rivers, lakes and water bodies, rendering their water unfit for drinking, washing and even aquatic life.
A hospital‑based study from SKIMS (2005–2008), published in the Indian Journal of Medical and Paediatric Oncology, found that more than 90% of patients who died of primary malignant brain tumours were orchard workers, pesticide mixers/sprayers, residents near orchards, or children playing in treated areas—an early medical signal that high pesticide exposure in Kashmir’s orchard economy is already associated with lethal cancers. Various health experts have expressed their concern about increased footfall of patients suffering with CKD, gastrointestinal problems, neurological problems and headaches in hospitals and high end institutes like AIIMS.
Equally pressing are the environmental crises unfolding before our eyes, yet seemingly unnoticed in the corridors of power. Our legislators must ask why rising temperatures in both Srinagar and Jammu are being ignored even as lakhs of trees are felled for ring roads and major infrastructure projects without any concrete environment mitigation plans from NHAI or the J&K Forest, Ecology and Environment Ministry. The development is, no doubt, required but any development project should not be cleared till it has a comprehensive mitigation plan to restore the damages caused to nature and the environment due its implementation.
The honorable legislators are requested to question the encroachment of river shores, riverbeds, the shrinking of wetlands that turn heavy rainfall into devastation, and the choking of city drains with uncontrollable plastic wastes that not only raise carbon emissions and temperatures but also forces cattle and aquatic life to ingest microplastics.
General masses and those concerned with the fragile eco system of our UT have high hopes upon our honorable legislators to press the government to ban disposable plastic water bottles up to 2 litres, a bold step already taken by Sikkim, which issued an official notification (No. 124/GOS/F&ED/PCCF‑ACS, dated 09.12.2021) under the Environment (Protection) Act, 1986, banning the manufacture, import, sale and use of plastic water bottles of 2 litres and below from 1 January 2022.
More recently, Ladakh, in June 2026, enforced a stringent ban on single‑use plastics including plastic water bottles through UT Administration Order No. 47 of 2026 (Department of Forest, Ecology & Environment) and a related GAD circular (No. 09‑LA (GAD) of 2026), with environmental penalties of up to ₹10,000 for violations. Maharashtra has also implemented single‑use plastic restrictions with a broader scope than just 2‑litre bottles, under its state notifications on plastic waste management.
With latest technologies now available to blend with proven safe pest control systems like Integrated Pest Management (IPM), and with strong incentive policies needed for biopesticides, there is an urgent need for strict and concrete measures to reduce hazardous agrochemical usage at least to the national average, to save our people, soil, air and water, and to ensure chemical residue free food for consumers.
We remain hopeful that before the culmination of this ongoing Assembly session, a few among our honourable legislators will raise these critical issues concerning public health and nature in a strong, united voice, for development without environmental safeguards is no development at all, and a healthy population is the true wealth of any nation.
