India, Oct. 31 -- A fertiliser subsidy is not usually considered part of national health policy.

Perhaps it should be.

Because cheap urea, alongside cheaper irrigation and guaranteed procurement, changed what India ate, with consequences for our collective health.

Consider pulses. In the late 1970s, rural Indians ate about 34 gm of pulses a day. By 2023-24, this had fallen to 25 to 27 gm a day, or about half a small bowl of cooked dal.

As pulses receded from Indian fields and plates, we lost one of our cheapest, most climate-friendly sources of protein.

Consider a family of four that gets all its protein from dal. Based on current retail prices, switching to eggs would cost them Rs.33,000 more a year (though eggs, to be fair, offer a...