Bhopal: Gas victims have expressed displeasure after Supreme Court rejected a curative petition seeking additional compensation of over Rs 7000 crore on March 14.
Rashida Bee, President of the Bhopal Gas Peedit Mahila Stationery Karmchari Sangh said,”The Supreme Court Bench has deliberately ignored arguments against Union Carbide using fraudulent means to settle the case on the disaster in February 1989. Our lawyer who the Court named and attempted to shame, in fact presented documentary evidence of Union Carbide’s representative misleading Indian government officials into believing that majority of survivors suffered only temporary injuries. There is not a word in the decision about this.”
Balkrishna Namdeo of Bhopal Gas Peedit Nirashrit Pensionbhogi Sangarsh Morcha said, “The Court’s claim that Bhopal survivors received six times more compensation than that provided under the Motor Vehicles Act is overwhelmingly false.
"The MV Act of 1988 stipulates payment of Rs. 50,000 to Rs. 2.5 lakhs to victims of injury depending on its severity and the number of Bhopal victims have received six times the minimum amount is less than 1 % of the claimants.” he added.
Rachna dhingra of the Bhopal Group for Information and Action said, ”The judgement displayed ignorance of the basic fact that contamination of groundwater in Bhopal by Union Carbide’s hazardous waste predates the gas disaster of 1984 and is unrelated to it. They chose to ignore that the ongoing contamination is due to unsafe dumping of poisonous waste before and after the disaster by Union Carbide. It also did not factor in the deteriorated condition of land which Union Carbide had taken on lease.”
Said Nawab Khan President of Bhopal Gas Peedit Mahila Pursh Sangarsh Morcha, “ The 34-page decision, in no way, indicate that scientific facts on medical consequences of exposure to Union Carbide’s leaked gas were considered.
Nousheen Khan of Children against Dow Carbide, said “The judgement is biased as it completely omits the fact that Union Carbide continues to abscond from the criminal case on the disaster.”
