Horrors of Bhopal Gas Tragedy 1984: Biggest industrial disaster

in the world

The Bhopal gas tragedy that had caused 3,000 deaths instantly and nearly 25,000 deaths over
the next couple years apart from incurable diseases, physical and mental disorders to over
half-a-million people, is nearly a forgotten affair today.
It's India's shame not just because the main culprit, Warren Anderson, could never be
arrested or extradited.

It's also our shame because the ministers and bureaucracy has done its best to absolve the
culprits and suppress the voice of the victims. After a quarter century, none of the accused
could be sentenced or jailed as cases drag on.

The apathy on part of Congress and BJP governments towards the fate of the survivors and
whose children also suffer from disorders, is shocking. The pain and suffering is such that one
might get insane just by a visit to any of these areas, and it's nearly impossible to write about
it in a few pages.

But I must recount the events on the dark night of December 2 and 3, 1984:

Nearly 40 tonnes of lethal Methyl Isocyanate had escaped from the Union Carbide factory in
Bhopal. The pesticide plant was shifted from America because it was 'too risky' for
Americans. In third world country, it was 'welcome'. Nearly a 100 safety standards were cut
down in Bhopal plant as per directives of the company from its US-based head office.

It was a strange night, which none of the citizens can forget. People woke up at night--
coughing, vomiting and running--until they fell and died on the streets. Panic struck the entire
city. The railway station was nearby and hundreds lay dead on the platforms as the killer gas
spread across the capital city.

Railway officials steadfastly did their duty, doing their best to inform the officials from Mumbai
to Jhansi, to stop train traffic and not let any train reach Bhopal.

There were no cell phones and no computerised signalling system. Most trains were stopped
outside, except one [and most of the passengers onboard died]. But in the morning, 23
railway employees were found dead.

Meanwhile, elsewhere in the city hundreds died in sleep. Others lay dead on streets.
Throughout the night doctors tried to find ways to treat but there was no medicine for such a
deadly chemical. Union Carbide officials said there was no antidote to MIC gas.

Kids were dying in the arms of doctors. Those doctors who tried to resuscitate the children,
themselves died as they came in contact with the gas. With the crack of dawn, the City was to
come to terms with the gravity of the gas tragedy.
Funeral pyres kept burning for days, Fatwa for mass graves

In hospitals, there was nothing except bodies of men, women and children. The funeral
pyres in shamshans kept on burning. Where were the qabristans for the thousands of dead?
The special fatwa was issued for mass burials, so that dozens of Muslims could be buried in
each qabr. Men and women were identified on the basis of their religions and last rites were
performed as everybody volunteered to help.

The Chief Minister Arjun Singh had already left Bhopal. Panic was further aggravated with the
news that there is still gas in the tanks. Later there were statements that the remaining gas
would be released. This led to greater panic and for weeks and months people kept leaving the
city.

Mass exodus, frenzy and fear

Nearly 1,000 big buses were arranged by government to ferry people out. Others left on
whatever vehicle they could and most ran on foot. This was one of the biggest mass exodus
from a City in modern times, all because of absolute failure of government and administration.

Trains passing through Bhopal wouldn't stop for long in those days. The train passengers
would keep the compartments shut from within even though it was a common sight to see
families and their children cry, begging them to open the gates. This was a tragedy of such
magnitude that had no parallel in modern world.

Then the legal battle began. A compensation was agreed upon. Contrary to perception, it was
not at all sufficient. Suddenly dalaals [brokers] appeared. Whatever was the compensation
given by Union Carbide, was not properly distributed.

The real victims' money was distributed in parts of City where the gas had little effect,
because of political considerations.

Survivors, Victims sans medical care

The super-specialty hospitals built with the money meant for gas victims, are flush with funds,
but don't provide treatment and medicines to the survivors.

Instead private patients are entertained. The victims live in extremely polluted slums where
toxicity is so high that young ones look middle-aged, thousands of women suffer from
gynaecological complications and the poor have nobody to turn.

The women widowed by the tragedy, live in the locality ironically named Vidhwa Colony, many
of them barely getting barely a pension of Rs 150. Water is so toxic that none of us can
imagine. Life remains the same for lakhs living in clusters like JP Nagar, Qainchi Chhola, Oriya
Basti, Qazi Camp and numerous other slums-localities in the area around Union Carbide.

The compensation had to be distributed among around 1.5 lakh people who were gas affected
in 1984-85. Them and their children together numbered nearly 2-3 lakh by the next decade.

However, to gain political mileage--the compensation that was meant only for the victims, was
distributed in New City also, ahead of elections. Not many got compensation over Rs 1 lakh.

As a result the real victims got much less of what they would have otherwise got.
Compensation was distributed among 5 lakh people. Though it was a pittance--just Rs 25,000.
Had the 25,000-each given to 4 lakh-odd non-victims, kept for the gas victims, the real
victims could have benefited.

But even this colossal human tragedy was communalised. In the aftermath of Babri Masjid-
Ram Temple dispute, a campaign to get compensation to New Bhopal residents was launched.
The hidden message was that it was the Muslim-majority Old Bhopal that had got money.
Ironically, this was also untrue.

Though Walled City in Bhopal has a clear Muslim majority, the areas that were affected had a
predominant Hindu population. Among the gas victims, over 62% were Hindus, who were
migrant labourers and poor workers. But this ploy did work.

The Union Carbide was bought by Dow Chemicals. There was a large quantity of poisonous
waste in factory, which remains to this day. The factory had to be cleaned up, as the waste is
polluting groundwater in the entire area, causing deadly diseases and producing
generations that are frail and always ailing.

Bureaucrats made money, then lost interest

Bureaucrats including many senior IAS officers were interested in Gas Relief ministry and its
projects as long as funding was there. When hospitals were being built, they were happy as
contracts were awarded for everything from construction to buying of equipments, and they
got 'cut'. There was money in everything: even in calling companies to remove toxic
waste remaining in factory.

When the hospitals were established, they lost interest--so what if doctors were not
appointed and machines remained unused, even patients turned away, emergency and
OPD kept shut at night--after all, there was no money for them now.

A strategy was devised to hush up each and every issue. Everytime a high-flying
minister from Delhi would come, he would say that there was no waste, no pollutant and
nothing needed. After all, the victims were mostly--poor, unable to fight cases, not like us--
and could be ignored.

It was long back that governments had stopped medical studies. Those who died due to after-
effects of the gas tragedy, were not counted after 1990. The true figure of deaths could be
anything from 50,000-1 lakh and even more.

The reports that indicated governments and highlighted the presence of extremely toxic
substances, were not 'accepted'. Bribe was paid, Carbide was let off and leave the country.
The ugly corporate-bureaucrat-minister nexus worked wonderfully for the killers.

18,000 Metric Tonnes of Waste Vs 360 tonnes: Even Commission in Clean-up

They shouted from the rooftop that there was just 360 tonnes of toxic waste left. For
decades carbide had functioned in Bhopal. The reality is that the premises--67 acres has
nearly 8,000 Metric Tonnes of the most poisonous chemicals' concoction in the world, buried
in the ground, that is killing the poor in the adjoining areas.

And a further, 10,000 Metric Tonnes, is buried in the nearby open land where the effluent was
dumped for years. And nobody would talk about it. After all, the poor can be allowed to drink
this poison. Who cares? They don't get treatment. Who cares? They die. Who cares? Of
course, a few do.
On the left is the photograph of Ghazala on Eid in 1984. Just a few months later, she lost her
vision and the toxic gas turned this bubbly and beautiful girl into permanently ill individual.

Despite doing their best to get her treated and in process selling off whatever they had, her
parents--who were also gas affected, died.

Ghazala is just one of the innumerable individuals who lost their dreams forever on gas
tragedy. The irony is that there are similar stories in thousands of households in Bhopal.

Death Toll in Chernobyl [Russia]: 56

Death Toll in Bhopal Gas Tragedy: Over 25,000 until 1990
when govt stopped counting the deaths due to gas and its after-effects.

What is worse that even relief and rehabilitation was denied to majority of the
survivors. Today, not just the after-affects linger, the diseases are passed on to next
generations. More over, the huge toxic waste that hasn't been cleaned up in and around
factory, has poisoned the soil and water. The contamination level is a whopping 60 times more
in these areas.

Sick hospitals

On the left is the photograph of the super-specialty Bhopal Memorial Hospital and Research
Centre (BMHRC) that was established at a cost of Rs 175 crore, after the dollar 470 million
dollar settlement between the Centre and multinational company, however, this sprawling
hospital complex that is built over 150 acres is in a total mess.

Of the 16 departments, just nine could be established. Gas patients that ought to have been
treated free for life, are not given free treatment and asked to go elsewhere, costly medicines
aren't given, no patient howsoever critical he may be, is admitted.

On the contrary, private patients who can pay up are given benefits of this hospital. Besides,
of the 133 posts of doctors, nearly 75 are vacant. All costly equipment that had been bought
are getting rusted in this hospital. Strangely, neither state government nor the administration
take any interest.

Reasons are not far to seek. Wherever the upper class and the vocal or connected middle class
goes, things do remain at least in a working condition.

This is true for most govt hospitals in India, which are now frequented by poor, as the rest go
to private nursing homes, which are well-maintained.

The gas victims are mostly from the poor stratum. Naturally moneyed and salaried class goes
to private hospitals and the govt hospitals in Bhopal are in a really bad shape.

Activists and even journalists seem to have given up, as government doesn't bother. This is
not just the tale of BMHRC. But conditions in the Indira Gandhi Hospital, Kamla Nehru
Hospital, Shakir Ali Khan Hospital and Rasul Ahmad Siddiqui Pulmonary Centre that were all
built specifically for the purpose, are even worse.
The last, RAS Pulmonary Centre, was built because gas victims suffer from diseases of lungs
and there are few specialists. The cruel joke is that today, this hospital has 'dentists' posted
instead of the specialists who were needed for curing the critically ill.

Even justice not just got delayed but was also denied. Whatever little compensation the
victims got was too little and too late, obtained through 'dalaals'. When victims are poor,
media also lose focus. Courts also go ahead only to an extent, as organisations fighting the
case don't have money to hire the top lawyers.

There is no public outrage as in the case of lobbying done by the vocal middle-class in Jessica
Lal case or similar other high-profile murders.

Bhopal Gas Tragedy

Compensation for death: Rs 1 lakh
Injured and gas-affected: Rs 25,000
Received after 8-20 yrs with out any interest paid

Uphaar Cinema Hall Fire

Compensation: Rs 15-18 lakh
Received after 6 years with 9% interest

World Trade Centre Attack

Compensation: Received within a year

Ruth Waterman and the story of Mamta

Mamta was just six when she got separated from her mother, who was running holding her
youngest child.

The baby died in arms and and she also died. Mamta grew motherless. Also a gas victim, with
no money for treatment let alone education. Ruth Waterman, who had lost her parents in
Hitler's gas chambers, and herself as a minor girl survived Holocaust, had met Mamta.

It was Waterman who had created the sole monument ever made in the memory of gas
victims. Her sculpture of universal mother with a baby in arms and Mamta [not visible in this
view] clinging by the mother's dress, is symbol of gas tragedy.

For 25 years no state or central government thought that there was need for any memorial.
Suddenly there was a proposal to earmark Rs 116 crore for the purpose this year. And the
bureaucrats for whom gas tragedy was disinteresting, again came back like 'vultures' to feast
on the funds.
Politicians, bigwigs lobbying for Dow Chemicals

In no other country, any public figure would have brazenly tried to speak against the interests
of nearly half-a-million citizens and absolve the company it of its responsibility. [Dow
Chemicals had taken over Union Carbide Limited]. However, Congress leader and
spokesperson Abhishek Manu Singhvi pled the case for Dow.

Nost just Kamal Nath, Montek Singh Ahluvalia but also P Chidambaram lobbied for the same
cause.The chemical company has been shrugging all its repsonsibility towards cleaning the
huge contamination, factory effluent, and toxic waste lying over an area of 67 acres in Carbide
and around.

Even though the case is sub-judice and despite the fact that it is well-known, the intense
lobbying took place. It could shame everybody.

*Abhishek Manu Singhvi, the lawyer for Dow, gave opinion to Prime Minister's office that Dow
can not be held responsible for cleanup

*Dow chairman Andrew Liveris wrote to Indian Ambassador Ronen Sen that Union ministry for
chemicals and fertilisers should withdraw its application for remediation costs. Soon the then
Finance Minister P Chidambaram wrote to Prime Minister over the issue.

*Montek Singh Ahluvwalia sent a letter to PMO explaining that it is not possible for DOW to
come up with its proposed investment in India unless the liability issue is cleared.

*Kamal Nath wrote to PM that resolving the issue was necessary to give the right signal to
Dow, which is exploring investment opportunities in India.

*Ratan Tata wrote to planning commission that it was critical for Dow to have the ministry
withdraw the application for a financial deposit against the remediation cost.

*Most recently Jairam Ramesh came to Bhopal, visited Carbide factory and stunned everybody
by declaring that there was no toxic waste left, here.

[This is the second part of the series on Gas Tragedy. As a child I was witness to the horrors
of the gas tragedy and as a journalist covered it to some extent. The aim is to provide a true
account of the tragedy and its aftermath, which many weren't aware outside Bhopal because it
was not a satellite-TV/internet era back in 1984. ]