Bhopal_Justice denied

Today in India every news paper and TV channels talk about Bhopal gas disaster.The below given is the news of the Bhopal gas disaster.

(Beside photo:- Bhopal, December 3, 1984: Two women and their children lie dead on a street after inhaling methyl isocyanate.)

JUNE 7, 2010, marks a milestone in disaster litigation in India. On that day a trial court in Bhopal pronounced its verdict in the case relating to the gas leak from the Union Carbide plant in the Madhya Pradesh capital on the night of December 2-3,1984.

The world's worst industrial disaster killed at least 20,000 people and left thousands maimed and helpless. Thousands of victims and activists had gathered in front of the district court building in the city where Chief Judicial Magistrate (CJM) Mohan P. Tiwari read out the nearly 100 pages of his judgment, convicting seven accused, in two hours. He resumed again after lunch to award the sentence and with it bring to a close one of the sordid chapters of the Bhopal gas litigation.

In the past 25 years, excruciating years for the victims, the law had been circumvented and the delivery of justice delayed. When justice came in the end, it had been greatly diluted. The grossly disproportionate punishment of two years' imprisonment that the Judge handed out to the seven convicted persons jolted civil society out of its years of indifference to the victims' plight and forced it to ask uncomfortable questions. Among them were questions on the role of the political leadership and the collusion of institutions in encouraging the impunity of the accused. The CJM's helplessness in awarding appropriate punishment to the accused was obvious to all. He simply obeyed the Supreme Court's direction in 1996 not to bring the charge of culpable homicide not amounting to murder (under Section 304 Part II of the Indian Penal Code) and charge the accused with committing a rash and negligent act causing death (under Section 304A of the IPC). The maximum punishment under Section 304 Part II is 10 years' imprisonment, while it is only two years under the latter section.

The Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI), entrusted with the prosecution of the accused, had charged 12 persons, of whom three were corporate judicial persons. All of them were charged with committing a rash and negligent act resulting in death.


Beside photo: A woman who was partially blinded by the gas waits for the verdict at the district court in Bhopal on June 7.


One of the accused, Union Carbide India Limited (UCIL), had a factory at Berasia Road, Bhopal, manufacturing pesticides Sevin and Temic, which involved the use of methyl isocyanate. The plant also manufactured MIC and stored it in underground tanks, identified as tanks no.610, 611 and 619. On the intervening night of December 2-3, 1984, from 12-00 to 12-45 a.m., MIC escaped from tank no.610 in large quantities, causing the death of thousands of human beings and animals and injuring the health of lakhs of human beings.

The manufacture of MIC is known to involve an extremely hazardous process. But there was no information available at the factory site about the precautions to be taken if the gas leaked and spread, and there was no warning given to people residing around the factory.

Later, a team of scientists, led by S. Varadarajan, Director-General of the Council of Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR), found that MIC was stored in large quantities and that it was the possible entry of water into tank no.610 during washing that caused the disaster.

S. Varadarajan of the CSIR, a prosecution witness, stated that there were several defects. He pointed out that MIC was a liquid that evaporated when it came in contact with air and was highly toxic on inhalation as it contained carbon monoxide. Carbon monoxide converted into phosgene is required to be utilised immediately and not stored. Storage of MIC, he said, should have been highly limited only to meet the requirements of conversion into Sevin.

The atmosphere on the court premises on June 7 was illustrative of this alienation. Protesting voices filled the air when the police claimed that the CJM had ordered that activists, victims and journalists be kept out of the courtroom. Within minutes, activists and the police clashed and victims who had waited for 25 years to hear the judgment were stopped indiscriminately. The police made it clear that the CJM had ordered that nobody except the accused and prosecution and defence lawyers be allowed.
-News and photoes courtesy by Frontline,www.frontline.in


Public Relations Officer and Spokesperson , Catholic Council of Bishops, Madhya Pradesh Fr. Anand Muttungal says in his article of the the disaster, "The law that we propose must have provisions to deal with better design of the facilities to handle toxic materials, location of such industries, preventive maintenance strategies, worker training programs, environmental education programs, development of systemic hazard evaluation models, emergency planning, disaster preparedness programme, time bound compensation and justice to victims etc. If these industrial and legal disasters do not force us to clamour for better system, it would be an unforgivable sin against our future generation."

Click - BHOPAL GAS TRAGEDY ARTICLE by Fr.Anand