Genetically modified or transgenic crops are controversial across the world. Advocates see such crops as crucial for the economic and environmental sustainability of farming; critics oppose them on these very grounds. India leads the world in terms of the intensity of democratic engagement with genetically modified crops. Anthropologist Aniket Aga excavates the genealogy of the ongoing debate around the commercial release of transgenic food crops in India, investigating how democracy is transformed when conflicts of interest clash with disputes over truth.