These bills were drafted earlier by the United Front government.PVPFR Bill is to be tabled by the union agriculture ministry and BDC Bill is to be tabled by the union ministry for environment and forests.

Significant changes has been made in the PVPFR Bill to water down its content so that the country can avail of the opportunity of the membership of UPOV, 1978 which closes by April 1999. Even the nomenclature has been changed and it is called only by Plant Varieties Protection (PVP) Bill. The provisions for farmers' rights have been considerably diluted.

As the choice to have a PVP Act or not is not available to India under TRIPs accord, the Centre had earlier chosen to have a `weak' PVP Act or patent law which is TRIPs consistent. Article 27(3)(b) of GATT obliges member countries to provide for protection of plant varieties either by patents or an effective `sui generis' (of its own kind, unique, separate or independent) system or a combination of both by 1999. In this context, the United Front government preferred to have a `sui generis' law.

But the present government, preferred to join the membership of UPOV, 1978, and tune the Bill accordingly. But whether UPOV, 1978 is TRIPs consistent or not is again a matter of dispute among experts.

But as the 1991 revision of UPOV has strengthened the rights of the breeders in various ways as compared with that of the farmers, the present government decided to join UPOV, 1978. The genera and species to be covered have been widened and farmer's privileges has been narrowly defined in UPOV, 1991. Besides the interpretation of the confusing Article 27(3)(b) of the TRIPs agreement by patent offices and courts in Europe are very broad and now include many areas of plant biotechnology.

The earlier draft of PVPFR Bill prepared by UF government was designed to ignore the membership of both UPOV 1978 and 1991 a strengthen farmers' rights in a greater way.

The earlier draft of PVPFR Bill had categorised farmers as plant breeders along with the concerned scientists and seed companies. The draft stated that farmers, whose generations have taken pains to develop several varieties of seeds over centuries, are also plant breeders in the real sense. The draft proposed constitution of a National Community Gene Fund to help farmers improve crop varieties. It suggested documentation and denomination of seed variety, novelty of breed and conducting of distinctive uniform stable (DUS) tests.

The protection to breeders was given only for 12 years in the earlier draft. But researchers were allowed free access. Farmers were given the right to use and dispose off the farm-saved seeds by whichever way they opted. The draft stipulated constitution of a regulatory authority to see that the farmers were not unnecessarily harassed by withholding of seed varieties by the seed companies. In such an eventuality, the regulatory authority was empowered to seize the particular variety from the seed company under compulsory licensing scheme and distribute it to farmers. The regulatory authority was also empowered to enforce the Licence of Rights in case of difficulties posed for multiplication of a particular variety of seed.The earlier draft of PVPFR Bill had adequate provision for protection of varieties under geographical apellation of the region and suggested to have a common `sui generis' law for the entire SAARC region.

Similarly the third and the revised draft of Biodiversity Conservation (BDC) Bill intended to protect all bio-resources of the country, other than agricultural crops which are covered under PVP Bill.

It does not, however, provide a legal shape to the rights of local communities to their biodiversity in the form of seeds, medicinal plants, fish and animal diversity. It has failed to implement Article 8(j) of the convention on biodiversity (CBD) on protection of indigenous knowledge and innovation so as to prevent biopriracy. It has also failed to implement Article 14 of CBD for regulating and avoiding activities that have adverse impact on biodiversity. Also the provisions of Article 19(3) of CBD regarding the potential negative impact of genetically engineered organisms on biodiversity has not been covered under the proposed Bill.

The very weak Article 12 on benefit sharing in the revised draft is useless in context of biopiracy and subsequent patenting as in the case of basmati. The Article 27 to 30 of the revised draft exoerates public servants from any prosecution for anything done in good faith in pursuance of this Act and Rules made thereunder. This shows that the Bill lacks accountability.