Republican News · Thursday 1 August 2002

Bhopal: The nightmare goes on

What happened in Bhopal is just one example of Western corporations' and multinationals' disregard for basic health and safety procedures in factories in developing countries

On the night of 2-3 December 1984, 40 tons of methyl isocyanate (MIC), hydrogen cyanide, mono-methyl amine and other lethal gases began spewing from Union Carbide Corporation's pesticide factory in Bhopal, India.

As the plant's safety siren was turned off, the communities of Bhopal did not know of their danger until the gas was upon them in their beds, searing their eyes, filling their mouths and lungs. It was a massacre. Dawn broke over residential streets littered with corpses. In just a few hours, numberless innocents had died in fierce pain and unimaginable terror.

Over half a million people were exposed to the deadly chemicals. The gases burned the tissues of the eyes and lungs, crossed into the bloodstream and damaged almost every system in the body. Nobody knows how many died but in the next days more than 7,000 death shrouds were sold in Bhopal. With an estimated 10-15 people continuing to die each month, the number of deaths to date is put at close to 20,000. And today more than 120,000 people are still in need of urgent medical attention.

In the last few weeks, solidarity has sprouted around the world in support of the Bhopal victims' relatives and the survivors, as the Central Bureau of Investigation of the Indian government applied to the Bhopal court to reduce the criminal charges against Warren Anderson, CEO of Union Carbide Corporation at the time of the gas leak. Survivors fear that if the application is accepted by the judge, it will effectively end the outstanding case against Anderson and Carbide, and will mean the end of any hopes for the survivors to get proper compensation for their nearly 18 years of suffering.

On 28 June, two women survivors of the Union Carbide gas leak, Tara Bai, 36, and Rashida Bi, 46, accompanied by longtime Bhopal activist Satinath (Sathyu) Sarangi, 48, sat down outside the Indian Parliament at Jantar Mantar, New Delhi, and vowed to take no food until the government reversed its decision. They were accompanied by hundreds of gas survivors from Bhopal, with their children.

Tara was 19 and three months pregnant when the gas leaked. The gas burnt her lungs and she lost her baby. She was then told that she could never conceive again. Tara is partially blind, has chronic breathing difficulties and has been diagnosed with neurological problems.

Rashida lost five gas-exposed members of her family to cancers. Left permanently semi-blind by Carbide's gases, she leads one of the most active survivors' organisations. In Bhopal, she is legendary for having once led several hundred women and children on a month-long march to Delhi.

Sathyu is a metallurgical engineer who gave up everything to help the gas-affected of Bhopal. He went to the city the day after the disaster and has stayed ever since.

They demanded that the Indian government:

reverse its application to dilute the outstanding criminal charges against Warren Anderson and Union Carbide and press for the extradition of Warren Anderson and Carbide executives from the US, invoking an existing treaty;

compel Dow Chemicals (of which Union Carbide is now a wholly owned subsidiary) to assume Union Carbide's liabilities in Bhopal, as they have done in other cases in the US;

and rescind its order to distribute the compensation money, which rightfully belongs to the survivors, among 20 non-gas-affected wards.

Instead, the campaigners claim the government should arrange to distribute the money among the victims of the disaster, 94 percent of who have received a meagre $500 each for lifelong health impacts and lost livelihoods.

The hunger strikers allege that the Indian government's decisions are a direct result of behind-the-scenes pressure by Dow Chemical - one of the main suppliers of agent orange - which made Union Carbide a wholly owned subsidiary in February 2001.

In New Delhi, a mass rally of survivors and their supporters marched to Parliament to support the hunger strikers' demands. Promises of support were received from many political parties, including from Sonia Gandhi, President of Congress. Large rallies in Chennai, Bangalore and Baroda echoed the hunger strikers' demands.

Around the world, there were protests outside Indian embassies and High Commissions in New York, Washington DC, Cape Town, Madrid and other places. In London, a 1,000-signature petition was handed in to the Indian High Commission. In Venice, Deputy Mayor Gianfranco Bettin and members of his administration carried out a three-day fast supporting the Delhi hunger strikers. Groups and individuals protested in Stockholm, Amsterdam, Ramatuelle and Castelfranc in France. In the US, there were actions in Texas, Louisiana, Delaware, Ohio, Oregon, California, Florida and many other places.

Due to international pressure, the Indian government conceded the third demand, so gas survivors' money will now not be distributed in non gas-affected parts of the city. However, the Indian administration went ahead with its application in the Bhopal Magistrates Court. The court accepted a counter-submission from the survivors' organisations and adjourned the case until 27 August. After the adjournment was announced, Sathyu broke his fast. Tara and Rashida had had to stop when they were hospitalised because of their ill-health.

Eighteen years after the tragedy, the problems for the people of Bhopal are as serious as they were on the night of the disaster, which was caused by a cost-cutting drive initiated by Union Carbide Corporation. The executives wanted to enhance profits. To do this they reduced the number of personnel; lowered minimal training for operatives from six months to 15 days; used low quality construction material and day labour; and cut down on vital safety measures and hazardous operating procedures.

What happened in Bhopal is just one example of Western corporations' and multinationals' disregard for basic health and safety procedures in factories in developing countries, where they feel they can get away with unscrupulous practices that would not be envisaged in their countries of origin.

There were several warnings before the Bhopal incident. In 1981, a plant operator was killed by a phosgene gas leak. A further phosgene leak in January 1982 severely injured 28 workers and in the same year methyl isocyanate (MIC) escaped from a broken valve, resulting in four workers being exposed to the chemical. The results of clandestine medical tests conducted on the workers by Carbide doctors were sent to the US and were never released.

A 'business confidential' safety audit conducted by a US team in May 1982 identified "61 hazards, 30 of them major and 11 in the dangerous phosgene/MIC units". Nothing was done.

The number of operators for the MIC unit was cut in half between 1980 and 1984. On the night of the disaster, six safety measures designed to prevent a leak were either malfunctioning, shut down or were otherwise inadequate. The refrigeration unit was turned off in order to save $40 a day.

Eighteen years later, Union Carbide executives have not yet explained why they approved the factory's flawed design, the reckless cost-cutting, the highly unsafe quantities of lethal chemicals in storage and the lack of safety systems or emergency procedures.

After the leak, Union Carbide (UC) concentrated on liability evasion. The company's legal team arrived in Bhopal days before their medical team. The UC medical team constantly emphasised that the leaked gases would not have any long-term health effects. Chemicals that had already killed around 8,000 people were "nothing more than a potent tear gas", the company maintained. They recommended using sodium thiosulphate as an antidote, then advised against it as this treatment would have established that toxins had reached people's bloodstreams rather than affecting only their eyes and lungs. The company was anxious to play down the effects in order to avoid greater financial liability.

Poisons from the gases circulated through the bloodstreams of victims, damaging eyes, lungs, kidneys, liver, intestines, muscles, brain and reproductive and immune systems. The principal effects of exposure-induced lung injury have caused increases in bronchial asthma, chronic obstructive airways disease, recurrent chest infections and fibrosis of the lungs. Some 43% of affected women who were pregnant at the time of the disaster aborted. Studies revealed that the majority of children who were born had delayed gross motor and language sector development. Studies have also presented evidence of chromosomal damage. Immune systems have suffered. In the last five years, tuberculosis, cancers and menstrual disorders among young women has risen alarmingly.

Actions by Union Carbide are causing gas injuries even now. Reckless waste dumping has caused serious contamination of the Bhopal site. Greenpeace tested groundwater and soil samples in and around the site. They found heavy concentrations of carcinogenic chemicals and heavy metals like mercury. Mercury has been found at between 20,000 and six million times the expected levels.

To this day, the corporation refuses to disclose medical information on the leaked gases, maintaining it to be a 'trade secret'. Additionally, company 'experts' claimed that reports of victims' deaths were greatly exaggerated, and that the leak 'only' killed 1,408 people.

Union Carbide was directed to compensate those injured for the loss of their ability to work. The company refused to pay the US $220 million demanded by the survivors' organisations in interim relief. After five years of legal wrangling, the Indian government agreed to an out of court settlement of US $470 million in February 1989. This was to be the full and final settlement of all civil and criminal liability. The world's biggest industrial accident cost Union Carbide just 48 cents a share. If the accident had happened in the US, the company would have been bankrupt overnight.

The people of Bhopal are marked by the tragedy, socially as well as medically. Women find it hard to get married; husbands have deserted others as they cannot conceive, while widows have been outcast. Though women are often blamed, many men have become impotent.

Many more can no longer sustain their family economically. Over 70% of the exposed population were people earning subsistence wages. An estimated 50,000 are in need of alternative jobs because they can no longer do the physically demanding work that they did before.

Municipal authorities have found water from over 100 tube wells to be unfit for drinking due to the presence of cancer-inducing chemicals. Yet survivors of the Union Carbide Gas disaster have no choice but to drink, wash and cook with this water every day.

For more info: http://www.bhopal.net