BHOPAL GAS VERDICT Carbide Cat Out of Congress Bag

BHOPAL GAS VERDICT Carbide Cat Out of Congress Bag

Written by

DR. S. AUSAF SAIED VASFI

Published on

August 12, 2022

DR. S. AUSAF SAIED VASFI analyses the Bhopal gas leak verdict, holds the top echelons of administrative machinery for facilitating the escape of the main accused in the case, and calls upon the government to present the Carbide case afresh under appropriate sections.

Can you, by the way, recall the extraordinary treatment accorded to Mr. Daniel Walcutt, a criminal of first water, by the Nehru regime in the late ’60s?

The relevant questions today are: Did the late lamented Prime Minister, Mr. Rajiv Gandhi, really ask on telephone then Chief Minister of Madhya Pradesh, Mr. Arjun Singh to help escape Mr. Warren Anderson from Bhopal after the worst ever, December 3, 1984, industrial disaster of the Union Carbide factory that, almost instantly, gobbled up 15,274 lives – the latest figure stands at 35,000 – in addition to crippling 5.74 lakh people?

Did the really obedient Mr. Arjun Singh faithfully comply with the undignified, immoral and illegal instruction and saw to it that the star accused, who had been arrested earlier, was freed from fetters and was flown to New Delhi from where he took the first available flight for Washington?

Did the State Chief Secretary, the District Magistrate and the Police officer in-charge of the dirty duty, not politely point out the docile Chief Minister what he was doing and asking them to do was repugnant to law and commonsense?

Had the then Chief Justice of India, Mr. Aziz Mushabber Ahmadi been asked by any Tom, Dick and Harry to dilute the harsher section of the Indian Penal Code, and replace that with a lighter one, so that the crease of the suits of the accused was not disturbed? Did Mr. Ahmadi cover himself with glory by responding to the purported request and later on joining the Bhopal Memorial Hospital Trust as its life chairman?

 

MEDIA ROLE

To the utter chagrin and displeasure of the involved, the print and electronic media is legitimately abuzz with facts and holding the mirror to the Congress leadership of the day.

But why find fault with the Congress alone? The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) too had been in the saddle, both at Bhopal and New Delhi. Did it care to listen to the cries of the Bhopal widows and orphans by using stern and effective measures to bring back the fugitive, Mr. Anderson to face justice? Too obviously, this naive expectation from the Saffron is itself naivete. But we say so because leadership of a continent-sized country like the plural Bharat devolves its own obligations on the shoulders of the powers-that-be.

That Mr. Rajiv and other Congressmen forgot their national and international status and stature and esteem in which they are held is sad and repulsive.

That a Chief Justice of India, while dealing with the Carbide case, forgot he was heading the highest palladium of justice is sadder and nauseating. And, to put it mildly, a faux pas that shoots up blood pressure and defies description.

It is both depressing and infuriating that much more than the US administration, it was the top echelons of India who ditched and stabbed their own fellow brethren in the back. What they did was on the corpses of the dead. What stuff these politicians are made of beggars description. These worthies committed social and political promiscuity and faithlessness towards their citizens. The Congressmen, we feel, are a class by themselves.

 

UNCANNY KNACK

As the truth has an uncanny knack to unfold itself, now this class itself is spilling the beans. But the primary credit in this regard goes to those conscientious souls who had retired after exemplary duty. A bureaucrat who unfolded the story with clinical precision is a former CBI Joint-Director. “We (CBI) were forced by Ministry of External Affairs not to follow Anderson’s extradition,” said Mr. B.R. Lall, who headed the probe from April 1994 to July 1996. CBI had moved for Anderson’s extradition after he was declared an absconder in 1993. The Narasimha Rao-led Congress was in the office from 1991 to 1996.

Mr. Lall added: “The MEA communication came in 1994 by when we had filed a chargesheet for culpable homicide not amounting to murder (304 of IPC), which was changed to death due to negligence (304 A) by the Supreme Court. There was enough evidence and we were going ahead with investigations when MEA intervention slowed down the extradition process and he (Anderson) could never be brought to India.”

Another noble soul, Mr. Swaraj Puri, the then SP of Bhopal recalled: “A year before disaster, one person died while handling methyl isocyanite. It was established that the top management was aware of the danger it was putting its employees in. All of this should have been used to hold the company responsible.”

 

CONGRESSMEN VIEW

Veteran Congressmen like Mr. Digvijay Singh hold the view that the decision to free Mr. Anderson was taken under “US pressure”. Mr. Janardan Dwivedi, who is AICC General Secretary, exclaimed: “Facts must come out” and “responsibility must be fixed.” The opinion of Mr. Vasant Sathe, a former Union Minister, is “rogue elements at the Centre helped Mr. Anderson flee the country.” Earlier he had said: The MP government colluding with some people probably in the Home Ministry headed by Mr. P.V. Narasimha Rao, helped Anderson escape. Mr. Satyavarat Chatuvedi, member Congress Working Committee is of the view that the Arjun Singh government was solely responsible for the escape. To quote him: “The State government arrested Anderson and bail was given to him just there the same day. He was sent to New Delhi from where he was sent to America. Where is the role of the Central Government?”

 

CIA REVELATION

Now we feel these are stale pieces of hot news. The latest from Washington is: A CIA note declassified in January 2002 reveals that Mr. Rajiv Gandhi bailed out Anderson. The agency head stationed in India felt, “New Delhi believes State officers were overly eager to score political points against the company.” He says, “Both Central and the State governments were looking to deflect the blame on the subsidiary,” while the CIA did not hold the MNC primarily responsible for the disaster. This is from the proverbial horse’s mouth which does not leave anything for surmise or imagination.

 

DUBIOUS LEGACY

This dubious legacy has been inherited from the late Mr. Nehru, who had in the late ’60s released a foreign criminal Daniel Walcutt from Tihar Jail in New Delhi and seated him in his well-fuelled aircraft parked at the airport to fly towards whichever country he liked. Though no political commentator or leader has so far recalled this less-than-honourable event, which sadly finds a place in Mr. Nehru’s political career, we have referred to it so that Mr. Rajiv alone is not unwarrantedly pilloried. The first sin had not been committed by him.

And see the helplessness of the Congress today that it has tried to wash its hands off by saying it is for the government, not party to explain Bhopal. To quote the exact words: “The government, not the party would have to clarify the various aspects of the case as the facts are only with the government.”

Returning to the original subject, the Chief Judicial Magistrate Mr. Mohan Tiwari has in his 95-page judgement looked into the case in its proper perspective: “An American corporation cynically used a third world country to escape from the increasingly strict safety standards imposed at home.”

Mr. Tiwari added while listing major contributors to the disaster: “Storage of MIC, a highly dangerous and toxic poison in huge quantity when it was not required; gradual but sustained erosion of good maintenance practices; declining quality of technical training of plant personnel, especially its supervisory staff; failure of public address system and the failure of the State government, UCIL and UCC to alert the local public.”

 

AHMADI’S VIEW

What Mr. Ahmadi, in his wisdom, who diluted the harsher section of the IPC to the lighter one, has said in his defence deserves careful notice. He says: “It was a correct decision” of the Supreme Court bench headed by him in 1996, which converted the Central Bureau of Investigation charge under the stringent provision of 304 II that provides for the maximum of 10 years imprisonment to 304–A of IPC with maximum imprisonment of two years in the criminal case linked with the 1984 Carbide gas disaster.

The Union Law Minister has understandably tried to shield the Chief Justice by alleging: while the Central Bureau of Investigation had filed the case under section 304 of the Indian Penal Code (IPC) the Supreme Court, he said, had “understood it as 304A”.

Mr. Justice Ahmadi’s line of argument is: if his and his bench’s decision was wrong, why no review petition was filed during all these years. The sufferers’ spokesmen point out they asked the CBI to do the needful. But they didn’t. Then they filed a review petition on November 29, 1996.

We would be the last person to suspect the bonafides of the highly revered and respected former Chief Justice of India, Mr. Ahmadi, nor are we suspecting his motives, nor are we apportioning blame. However we are of the honest opinion that had Mr. Ahmadi and his bench applied mind more vigorously, they would have material placed before them sufficient to dissuade them from doing what they unfortunately did. There is evidence showing the Carbide top guns knew about the potential hazard of the pesticide plant. There were findings of the safety auditors and the design modification that made the factory even more hazardous. We, on our part, see an oversight, an error of judgement which needs to be corrected, even at this past stage.

 

FACE JUSTICE

The absconder, the fugitive, the proclaimed offender has to be brought to face justice for which the American presidents have even found eager. Just an example: Mr. Richard Milhous Nixon, who could not find weapons of mass destruction in any basement of Iraq, saw to it that Mr. Saddam Hussein was liquidated in his own country. Mr. Obama is continuing with Mr. Nixon’s mission in Afghanistan. Would the American president recall what he said recently: “The country that wants British Prime Minister to pay for damage in the Gulf of Mexico would not want Dow Chemicals Carbide for the world’s worst industrial disaster.”

Can he plead the case of Bhopal widows and orphans and help in sending the Culprit-in-Chief to Bharat to show character and face the consequences of his less-than-responsible and accountable doings.

The Government of India has revived GoM as a damage limitation measure. The revelations about Mr. Rajiv Gandhi by the CIA for his help in the escape of a killer have caused a deep dent in the credibility of the Congress. The Group of Ministers just cannot erase the deep dent. Let, as a first measure, the Centre clean rather cleanse the Carbide factory area which abounds in toxic material which has contaminated the ground water as well which the sufferers are drinking daily. They need to be supplied pure, clean, potable water.

An earnest effort has to be made by the Congress-led UPA dispensation to prepare and present the Carbide case anew under appropriate sections. A fast-track special court should be set up to deliver the judgement as soon as possible. Past errors have to be rectified. Simultaneously, a fool-proof case must be prepared to be filed in the United States of America. It should focus on the need of the extradition of the offender and appropriate compensation to the aggrieved.

Then and then alone the deep dent caused by the help in the great escape can be undone at least to some extent.

 

OUR VIEW

The last word: Now at least let the over a billion strong plural Bharat behave like a grown up regional power. Need we reiterate to prove the point that that degree of self confidence is required to be shown by India which may make the opponent sit up. We are more than a regional power; we are a nuclear power; we are an air power; we are a naval power and an industrial power in our own right.

Our leadership status and stature diminishes the moment we eagerly and anxiously comply with the ridiculous demands from the US. Would Washington oblige New Delhi if the latter makes similar requests? Equity and equality should be our criteria. We should refuse to be considered a pliable ploy or a client State.