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Bhopal gas tragedy: Government did not allow court-ordered probe

Activists demand execution of 22-year-old order to probe Union Carbide Corporation plant’s safety standards.

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Bhopal gas tragedy victims and the activists working for them have demanded that the government allow CBI to execute the letter rogatory issued by a Bhopal court 22 years ago for investigations in the United States (US).

According to the activists, the Bhopal chief judicial magistrate (CJM) had told CBI then to carry out a comparative study of Union Carbide Corporation (UCC’s) safety systems at its Bhopal and West Virginia plants to verify if the company had adopted dual safety standards. The activists said the government had to date not allowed CBI to execute this order, without which the investigations in the case were incomplete.

“Warren Anderson is not the only accused. There are a large number of officials posted at the Bhopal plant who neglected the safety measures and are responsible for the disaster,” said ND Jayaprakash of Bhopal Gas Peedit Sangharsh Sahayog Samiti.

“Action should be taken against Warren Woolmer, the UCC works manager who decided to shut down the refrigeration system for cost cutting in 1982. The safety systems were not fully operational during the time of disaster,” Jayaprakash said.

The victims expressed disappointment with the group of minister (GoM’s) recommendation for compensation, saying they felt cheated. Terming the compensation as mere eyewash and “posturing before international community” the victim groups said they wanted immediate compensation based on medical records.

“More than 1.5 lakh people who continue to seek medical treatment 25 years after the disaster have been categorised “temporarily injured” and denied compensation. Official data regarding deaths makes it appear that only 7 victims have died since 1992 and registration of deaths was arbitrarily stopped in 1997. The GoM has made no observations about this,” Jayaprakash said.

Satinath Sarangi from the Bhopal Group for Information and Action said, “We are going to ask the GoM to include second and third generation individuals who continue to suffer from contamination.”

They have also demanded a comprehensive assessment of water and soil contamination by a technically qualified agency.

“The European Commission had offered financial and technical assistance to carry out the assessment as per European standards. But the government did not accept this offer. The claim that the ground water is not contaminated has been refuted by more than 13 studies, including government agencies, Center for Science and Environment and Greenpeace,” Sadhna Karnik of Bhopal Gas Peedit Sangharsh Sahayog Samiti said.

The question of liability of UCC and its present owner the Dow Chemical Company, USA, has not been adequately addressed. The government has to make the polluters pay for the cleaning up, Rachna Dhingra from the Bhopal Group for Information and Action said.

The groups want an all-party committee, having members of the victims’ groups, to look into the matter again.

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