Plea in SC says Bhopal gas victims are ‘misclassified'
The petition filed by organisations such as the Bhopal Gas Peedit Mahila Purush Sangharsh Morcha urged the top court to direct the Centre to identify these 'misclassified' victims and classify them correctly under the provisions of the Bhopal Gas Leak Disaster (Processing of Claims) Act, 1985 so that they receive adequate compensation to cover their medical treatment.
The Centre has termed the Bhopal gas leak tragedy 'the world's largest industrial disaster'. Both the government and the Supreme Court have agreed the loss of innocent lives in the aftermath of the fatal escape of Methyl Isocynate (MIC) gas from the Union Carbide India Limited (UCIL) plant in Bhopal, Madhya Pradesh, on the intervening night of December 2-3, 1984 was 'horrific' in every sense.
Centre's responsibility
'A long history of litigation attempting to recover damages from the U.S.-headquartered Union Carbide Corporation (now part of Dow Chemicals Corporation) ended with the dismissal by the Supreme Court of the curative petitions in July 2023 wherein it was made clear that any shortfall in compensation to be paid to the victims were a responsibility of the Union government,' the petition said.
The organisations said they had data to show that survivors suffering from cancer and kidney failure as a result of toxic gas exposure were classified under the category of 'minor/temporary injury'.
'All these cases ought to have been added as a permanent disability category. Even as far back as in 1974, Union Carbide's internal document, titled MIC Plant Safety Considerations Report, had very clearly stated that in cases of inhalation of MIC 'major residual injury is likely in spite of prompt treatment'... This petition seeks to enforce that responsibility of the Union government, pointing out a certain category of cases in which the damages awarded and paid to be manifestly unjust and arbitrary,' the organisation submitted.
The case was listed for hearing before a Bench headed by Chief Justice of India B.R. Gavai on July 14. However, the Bench did not assemble due to the inavailability of the Chief Justice. The case status shows the next date as July 18. The petitioners are represented by senior advocate S. Muralidhar and advocate Prasanna S.
Focusing the extent of the disaster's impact on public health even decades later, the petition said records of the hospitals run by the government show that 'more than 30 years after the disaster, 95% of the population officially acknowledged to have been exposed to the toxic gas required hospital visits for their medical needs'.
'Data from the Central government-run hospital show that the incidence of heart ailments, neurology disorders, gastro and kidney ailments, psychiatric disorders and other chronic diseases is very high among gas-exposed patients. Records from eight community health units of the ICMR-run Bhopal Memorial Hospital and Research Centre [BMHRC] in Bhopal from 1998 to 2016 show that 50.4% of gas-affected patients suffer from cardiovascular problems and 59.6% suffer from pulmonary problems… In 2023 alone 2,06,016 gas victims visited the BMHRC,' the plea submitted.
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