Proper precautions

Proper precautions
The recent incident of water in one particular water cooler at the Kaiga nuclear power plant in Karnataka being spiked with heavy water serves as a wake-up call on industrial safety (‘Kaiga saga puts N-plant processes under review’, DNA, December 4). We need higher safety standards in dealing with hazardous substances. The Kaiga incident is nowhere on the scale of the Bhopal tragedy. But given the expansion that has been envisaged in the nation’s nuclear programme, foolproof safeguards against any untoward incident become vital.
—Yash P Verma, via email

Unfair measures 
We are shocked at the police lathi-charge on a morcha over the water shortage outside the BMC that left one person dead (‘One dies in protest against water cuts’, DNA, December 4). Media reports showed that the protestors were unarmed. The police say they were trying to break the law by entering the BMC. Violent mobs of the Shiv Sena and the MNS have run amok attacking innocents and destroying public and private property across the city but no policeman ever resorted to lathi charge against them. Why such outrage when other parties protest for basic needs? We demand that the officer who ordered the lathi-charge and those who carried it out be suspended; and the dead man’s family be compensated.
—Committee for the Release of Binayak Sen (CRBS ), Mumbai

Unmitigated disaster
Twenty-five years have passed since the Bhopal gas tragedy. Sheer negligence on the part of the Union Carbide management caused so much harm. The Central government also acted irresponsibly. The decision of the Supreme Court to give Rs715 crore in compensation for rehabilitation is not enough as the after-effects of the disaster will be felt for generations to come.
—Gopal D Sant,  Pune