Could Bhopal Gas Tragedy Have Been Avoided???
After an excruciating wait of 26 long years, finally the verdict was passed against the persons responsible for the Union Carbide gas leakage. And once again the saying "Too late a justice is justice denied" has been proved. The then Chairman of Union Carbide's Indian subsidiary - Union Carbide India Limited - Keshub Mahindra who now heads one of the largest manufacturing giants Mahindra & Mahindra, Vijay Gokhale, Kishore Kamdar, J. N. Mukund, S. P. Chaudhari, K. V. Shetty, and S. I. Qureshi of have been proven guilty of death due to negligence. B. Roychoudhari is now dead, and there is no mention of the CEO Warren Anderson at all.
All of the above have been sentenced to two year's imprisonment and a fine of Rs. 1,00,000 each. Of note is the fact that all of them were released on bail shortly after the verdict. Given the magnitude of the tragedy, 20,000 dead, over 550,000 seriously and permanantly disabled, the justice is too little and too late. The suffering still continues due to the lingering effects of the gas with thousands of children still being born with brain damages, missing palates and twisted limbs. Numerous people still suffer from heart problems. Of psychological effects the accident had, the numbers would be uncountable. The ground water is contaminated to such an extent that traces of the harmful elements is found today even in breast milk of the women.
The main accused, Warren Anderson was arrested on 4th December 1984 and was immediately released on a personal bail of $2000. After an assurance of returning to India when required, he was allowed to escape from the country!! How could the authorities have been so lenient with him??
Till today, he has not bothered to return nor are the authorities able to catch hold of him.
Could this major tragedy have been avoided in the first place??
Consider these revealing facts:
***Methyl isocyanate being extremely toxic due care should have been taken for its storage. Instead of storing these in large number of small-sized tanks, it was stored in a fewer large-sized tanks, no doubt to cut costs.
***Poor maintenance of safety equipments after the plant ceased production in the '80s. Faulty design of the plant itself. The fact that Union Carbide Corporation had experience of running a similar operation that uses MIC in West Virginia, USA, it was expected that the plant in Bhopal be built as per the design and sepcifications of the plant in West Virginia. Wasn't this rule followed?
***General conditions in the Union Carbide plant were extremely poor and lax.
***The most shocking and revealing fact was that the cooling system or the MIC tank refrigeration system which is extremely vital for the safety of the workers had broken down and
was nonfunctional since six months prior to the accident. Had this system been functional, it alone would have prevented the occurence of leakage. The accused were well aware of this fact and probably, the consequences if the leakage of gas due to broken down equipment occurred, yet did not bother to ensure the repairs of the same.
Wasn't this entire episode a calculated cold-blooded murder???
The reaction started when on the night of 2nd December 1984, work was started to wash the pipelines with water. Possibly the pipes had been corroded from the chemicals which resulted in water leaking into the tank holding almost 42 tonnes of methyl isocyanate. The chemical reaction that started resulting into soaring temperatures above 200 degrees celsius inside the tank. Had the refrigeration system been working, the resulting impact could have been contained to a major extent.
There are several other questions that come to my mind. When the Union Carbide's Indian subsidiary was allowed to set up plant in Bhopal, were the safety procedures, rules and regulations at the plant examined and verified to see if they complied with the industrial norms? Did the state government and the local politicians who held sway over granting permission to such projects were full aware of the safety standards, environmental impact and the impact of such projects upon the healths of the workers?? They probably did not think of all this or did not think it important enough. It is an unfortunate thing that most of the elected representatives of the world's second largest democracy FIRST set their eyes upon the constitution when they swear an oath upon it. This speaks volumes about the literacy and the general awareness of impacting issues of these members of parliament. Expecting such people to know anything about toxic and harmful chemicals would be too much. It is therefore easy to assume that money changed hands and many people became rich when this plant was set up!! Will efforts be ever made to ferret out these people who flouted all the laws and allowed to set up the project??
What about the inspection of safety standards and systems at the plant? There are laws in place which requires an inspection being carried out from time to time that all safety equipment and Standard Operating Procedures are in place and are complied with. How did the prevailing abysmally low conditions at the Union Carbide project escape inspection then? After the tragedy occurred, it came to light that the Government Department responsible for carrying out such inspections is in a miserable state. Similar to other government-run departments, they too face lack of funds, equipments, manpower, and in general lack of everything that will enable them to function efficiently and to full capacity. Most shockingly, these inspectors did not have absolutely any knowledge of toxic gases and chemicals. They did not know the composition and working of the Methyl isocyanate gas and its impact and effect on the human body. The knowledge of how to treat the damages caused by MIC was therefore nonexistent.
Another question to have been considered is the close proximity of such a project to the populated areas. When this tragedy occurred in 1984, there were huge slums in close proximity to the plant, which clearly was against the law. Who gave the permission to let the people live there? How did these slums grow? No doubt they had the blessings of the local politicians for whom such slums are no more than a vote bank. Their personal gains are more important to such people than safety and well being of the slum dwellers.
Did these politicians think that human lives are so cheap and easily expendable?? It seems they are; as has been proved by the verdict passed on the accused by the judge Mohan P. Tiwari.
It is indeed a mockery of the Indian Judicial System that the accused managed to walk freely away, to their homes and families. As to the victims, many have no homes and families left to go to!! There will be no peace for them ever; at least not in this lifetime!!
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