‘The response of the state and central governments to the ongoing environmental disaster is worse than their response to the gas disaster of December 1984’
BHOPAL — Four organisations of survivors of the catastrophic 1984 Union Carbide gas disaster in Bhopal have strongly refuted the claim of the Union Minister for Environment, Forest and Climate Change, Bhupender Yadav, regarding the clean-up of the “entire toxic waste.”
In a press release issued here recently, the organisations called the minister’s claim “false and misleading”.
Rashida Bee of the Bhopal Gas Peedit Mahila Stationery Karmchari Sangh said: “The minister’s claim cannot be further from the truth. Factually, less than 400 MT of poisonous waste has been moved away from the Union Carbide factory site. According to official records, this is a mere 1 % of the total amount of hazardous waste that lies buried inside and outside the factory premises in Bhopal.”
Rachna Dhingra of Bhopal Group for Information & Action recalled that “The Union Environment Minister himself had chaired a meeting on 19th June 2023 where it was acknowledged that assessment and remediation of contamination in and around the abandoned factory remained pending.”
“Obviously, the minister knew that the claim he was making did not align with the truth,” she added.
Balkrishna Namdeo of the Bhopal Gas Peedit Nirashrit Pensionbhogee Sangharsh Morcha said: “As per the scientific report of the Indian Institute of Toxicology Research, the hazardous waste buried in and around the factory has contaminated the groundwater within a 4 km radius of the abandoned Union Carbide factory (https://water.bhopal.net/). It is the apathy and inaction of the concerned ministers and their predecessors that have led to a situation in which the groundwater contamination is spreading towards the heritage natural lakes of Bhopal.”
“The response of the state and central governments to this ongoing environmental disaster in Bhopal is worse than their response to the gas disaster of December 1984, and not just in terms of the quality of official lies.” Said Nasreen Bee of Bhopal Gas Peedit Mahila Purush Sangharsh Morcha. “The state government that owns the land is yet to seek compensation for environmental damage from Union Carbide or its owner Dow Chemical and the central government remains to have the depth, spread and nature of hazardous contaminants scientifically assessed for real clean-up to begin,” she added.
The Bhopal gas tragedy, which occurred on the night of December 2-3, 1984, when poisonous Methyl Iso-cyanate gas leaked from the Union Carbide pesticide manufacturing plant, claimed the lives of 3,000 people almost instantly. Over the years, more than 25,000 have succumbed to the effects of the gas, and the tragic legacy continues unabated. Nearly half a million people continue to suffer from the side effects of the toxic exposure, with several thousand permanently disabled.
