Constitution@75: From Govt to Opposition, Everyone is United in the Assault on Scientific Temper

New Delhi: India marked the 75th year of adoption of its Constitution on November 26, 2024. Several events were organised to mark the day, including a session in the Central Hall of the old Parliament building.

The constitution makers understood the importance of inculcation of the scientific temper way back in 1949. Out of the 11 fundamental duties of citizens listed under Section 51(A) of the Constitution one explicitly mentions the significance of scientific temper.

“It shall be the duty of every citizen to develop the scientific temper, humanism and the spirit of inquiry and reform,” it says.

In fact, the Indian Constitution sets a rare precedent globally by being one one of the very few such documents that uses the phrase “scientific temper” explicitly.

But even after 75 years, the scientific temper of the citizens remains much far from perfect.  The same applies for governments, opposition, and celebrities and influencers.

An ‘unscientific’ government at the helm

During the last few years, we witnessed union ministers in-charge of various departments making several unscientific and dangerous claims on health and science. The most recent one, of course, came from railway minister Ashwini Vaishnaw, who after a lot of prodding by doctors, took down a video showing a travelling ticket examiner performing CPR on a passenger. Posting that video on X was dangerous because giving CPR to conscious people isn’t advisable (More on this later).

The 43rd edition of India International Trade Fair concluded on November 27. It was open for general visitors from November 19-26 and was attended by around a million people. The health ministry’s pavilion in the fair was inaugurated on November 14. The timing of the fair also coincided with some of the worst days till now in terms of air pollution in Delhi.

The Air Quality Index (AQI) on November 19 was 460 – the worst till date, this year, falling in the ‘severe’ category. According to Central Pollution Control Board (CPCB) daily bulletins, the AQI between November 19-26 ranged from 318 to 460.

The Delhi government had cautioned people that they should consider either working from home or going to offices in a staggered manner. When all these emergency measures were being adopted, the health ministry was  inviting people to visit its pavilion in the trade fair. How did this hold up to the basic principles of health and science when the air was causing invisible troubles from head to toe?

But to be fair with the health ministry, it was not alone. According to a government press release ,49 central government ministries, 33 states and union territories commodity boards, public sector undertakings (PSUs), public sector banks (PSBs), and renowned private companies were trying to lure common people with their products and services.

The fact that pollution is going to get worse during this time of every year is almost a predictable truth. Could this annual business event not be shifted to some other days of the year?

Besides the health ministry, the ayush ministry had also put up a pavilion in the fair. The ayush ministry, which was formed in 2014, frequently comes under fire from several doctors.

At the peak of second wave Covid-19, the government was found promoting giloy recklessly without telling which section of people must not take it. People with diabetes and a few other hormonal diseases must avoid it. In absence of such a warning, people ended up damaging their liver, a phenomenon that is now documented in scientific journals.

There have been many other instances where the ministry was found selling ayurvedic supplements with not-so-robust studies. For example, last year the ministry said through a study that ashwagandha was safe for us. The ministry’s tweet has been viewed by more than 77,000 people. Curiously enough, the study did not say, what exactly are the uses of ashwagandha supplements, putting onus on people to decide the answer.  The study design was shoddy. Only 80 participants were enrolled and observed for only eight weeks as doctors pointed it out.

The most recent assault, of course, came from union railway minister Vaishnaw. He posted a video of the TTE giving CPR to a conscious  passenger on a moving train. The caption of the minister’s X post read, “Our dedicated Indian Railway’s team.”

The video posted and now deleted by railways minister Ashwini Vaishnaw on X on November 25. Source: X/@AshwiniVaishnaw

It was wrong on multiple counts, primarily because CPR must never be performed on a conscious person as it could harm the individual. Even the government’s own guidelines say so, which Vaishnaw did not look into.

Hundreds of doctors begged the minister on X  to withdraw the post. But the minister remained adamant for more than 24 hours of posting the video. In a subsequent tweet he said CPR should be ‘stopped’ when a person becomes conscious, still refusing to delete the video. Finally, after the tweet became an international and national embarrassment, the minister deleted the video. It was viewed by more than a million people, as per X figures, by that time.

Weaponisation of misinformation by the opposition

It is not only the government and its agencies who launch an assault on the scientific temperament. The opposition parties left no stone unturned to propagate misinformation on Covid-19 vaccines this year.

Samajwadi Party chief Akhilesh Yadav claimed in a public rally on May 2 that the Covid vaccine ‘posed threat to life of 80 crore population of India’ and the vaccine was a ‘conspiracy to murder people’

Senior Congress leader Priyanka Gandhi contended in a public speech on May 4 the youngsters were  getting heart attacks due to the vaccines that they took, without citing any shred of evidence in her own statement.

The background to these statements was AstraZeneca ‘admitting’ in a court that its Covid vaccine caused blood clots,  But none of these politicians bothered to pay attention to the finer details. The adverse events were rare – 2 to 7.5 per million of the people vaccinated. The deaths due to blood clots could happen only until a few months after the administration of the vaccine.

They also ignored the fact it was known by 2021 itself that these adverse events were not completely preventable, as The Wire had reported after the purported admission.

Incidentally, a few days after the news of the court case, AstraZeneca announced it was going to withdraw its vaccines from the market. Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) Delhi minister Saurabh Bharadwaj on May 8 claimed the withdrawal happened as a consequence of the court case. This was misleading as he conveniently ignored the finer details.

According to the publicly available document of the European drug regulator, European Medicines Agency (EMA), the company had applied for withdrawal on March 5 – which was before the court case.  The EMA accepted the withdrawal on March 27. And, the withdrawal came into effect on May 7 – almost a week after the court case made news.

The company had reasoned that since the vaccine was no longer in use in 2024, therefore, it had decided to apply for withdrawal of  authorisation provided by the EMA.

Jharkhand chief minister Hemant Soren went on to claim on September 5 that “faulty Covid-19 vaccines were responsible for 12 candidates losing their lives during physical tests for an excise constable recruitment drive in the state.”

But what is most significant in the opposition’s tryst with pseudoscience was the timing of these comments made against vaccines.

Yadav and Gandhi made these dangerous comments during their election rally speeches as part of campaign for the last Lok Sabha polls. And predictably enough, Hemant Soren made his remarks as part of his electoral campaign in the recently concluded Jharkhand assembly elections.

This behaviour warrants two questions – were these remarks made out of ignorance of these leaders? Well, the timing clearly indicates, no. But even if they were made out of ignorance, one wonders whether these parties have dedicated science cells. If not, how difficult it would have been to consult experts before making these comments.

If these statements were not made due to lack of knowledge, then it was a classic case of  weaponisation of vaccine-misinformation for political gains. It was akin to “criminal conduct” because vaccine hesitancy had already picked up in India like never before.

Vaccine hesitancy is a dangerous tendency and it may very well spill from Covid vaccines to even routine vaccines for children – we have enough examples from the West about this. If it happens in India, even in miniscule proportions, decades of progress would stand undone.  Moreover, if a next pandemic comes, and people, en masse , refuse to take vaccines – even well tested vaccines – the opposition parties must share part of the blame as well.

Undoubtedly, it is the job of every citizen and political party to be scientifically temperamental and question the government on science as and when it is needed. The poor management of Covid-19 by this government provided enough scope to do so; as also the failure of the government to initiate studies on Covid vaccines once they had been used on populations after they were approved.

Known as post-approvals studies, such exercises help in understanding the long-term and real-life efficacy and safety of vaccines as against pre-approval clinical trials that are done on a limited number of participants before the vaccines are rolled out.

Sadly, instead of raising these complicated but crucial questions, the opposition indulged in misinformation and sensationalism.

Celebrities promoting bogus remedies

Recently, former Indian cricketer Navjot Singh Sidhu gained notoriety with his viral video in which he is found saying that his wife could beat fourth grade cancer by regulating her diet with lemon, turmeric and tulsi leaves.  He is also seen as wondering as to why people would say cancer treatment was very expensive when such simple remedies could cure the ‘emperor of all maladies’.

Sidhu argued that since her wife, a doctor, ate small meals, this stopped the growth of cancer cells.  The clip was shared so widely that 262 oncologists were forced to issue a joint statement because the clip went viral.

“[The] parts of the video imply that “starving the cancer by not eating dairy products and sugar*, consuming haldi (turmeric) and neem helped cure her “incurable” cancer. These statements have no high quality evidence to support them. While research is ongoing for some of these products, clinical data currently recommend their use as anti-cancer agents,” said the statement.

After being severely criticised by doctors, Sidhu posted yet another video clip the next day. The caption of the second clip  read ‘treatment + diet – great combination for cancer cure’. This was too little too late.

Criticism notwithstanding, Sidhu decided to double down. A day after posting these viral clips, he posted another statement, ‘in the interest of people’, making the ‘wonder diet’ public.

An oncologist shared all things wrong with that plan.

The US’s National Cancer Institute warns against such “starving”. It says cancer patients need to have enough food to overcome side effects of the treatment; extra proteins and calories may be required (the full advice can be read here ).

Again, singling out Sidhu would be wrong.

Indian sportspersons of different hues – from cricket to badminton and athletics – have been promoting questionable supplements and Bollywood stars who have huge influence on their fans keep appearing in surrogate ads of tobacco products.

The general public’s disregard for science

If the governments, opposition and celebrities are hardly cautious before presenting their opinion on issues concerning health and science, how can the general public be left behind?

It is no rocket science to understand that bursting crackers adds to the horror of air pollution. Still, people continue to flout the cracker ban with impunity, clearly giving a message to governments that a majority of them don’t consider air pollution a pressing issue to be dealt with – and therefore the administrators need not bother.

When politicians indulged in mudslinging campaigns against Covid vaccines, many people took no time to amplify those speeches without bothering to read adequately.

The market is replete with products which, for instance, claim to be treating both hypothyroidism (deficiency of thyroid hormone) and hyperthyroidism, (excess of thyroid hormone) – the two opposite ends of the spectrum. Can one product do so? Common sense would say no. But such products have a huge market because citizens continue to consume them.

It would be wrong here to only blame the citizens in such instances. These products are either sold as food supplements (approved by the Food Safety Standards Authority of India) or as ayurveda products. It is beyond understanding why any government, which claims to be nurturing scientific spirit, does not restrict their sale.

These few examples are no exception. A general tendency to drift towards everything anti-science, based on personal faiths and experiences, overriding evidence staring on face,  is something not hidden anymore.

As health reporters, almost as a routine job, we go on debunking ‘unhealthy’ myths – just like other conscientious citizens would attempt doing – be it on various social media platforms or non-official WhatsApp groups that we are part of.

Will these efforts bear fruits even when we celebrate 100 years of our Constitution? I am sceptical but remain optimistic.