Order of the National Green Tribunal in the matter of In Re: News Item titled "Are missing palm trees causing more lighting deaths in Bihar appearing in ‘The Times of India’ dated 29.05.2025". The original application was registered suo-motu based on the news item titled "Are missing palm trees causing …
Razia Sultana I ran away with my husband and 6 children on the night of the leak. But there was no escape from the toxic fumes. My husband was diagnosed stomach cancer and a heart condition. Till his death 2 years ago, we spent about Rs 70,000 on his treatment. …
ANOTHER year, another Bhopal memorial ritual over, but the government has learnt little from one of its people's hardest lessons. And the agony of those maimed over a decade ago continues unabated. Although laws have been enacted to protect citizens from accidents like the one that occurred at Union Carbide's …
Three voluntary organisations working among the victims of the Bhopal gas tragedy have moved separate applications before the court of the chief judicial magistrate in Bhopal, Alok Jha, seeking an injunction against the Union Carbide management to stop them removing any property from the infamous pesticide plant. They have also …
Nine years after the world's worst industrial accident, an international team of 15 doctors and researchers arrived in Bhopal. Their objective: to "provide consultative support towards the Bhopal survivors' long-term medical care, health monitoring and attribution of their health problems to the exposure". The findings of the team, led by …
IN INDIA, environment is hardly an election topic. No one expects political parties to make environment a plank and neither do most voters base their decisions on ecological promises. However, in the just-concluded assembly elections in Uttar Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh, Himachal Pradesh, Rajasthan and Delhi, the absence of a burning …
FOR THE candidates of Bhopal (North) constituency, the area worst affected by the gas leak in 1984, relief for the victims seems to be a non-issue. Congress candidate Rasool Ahmad Siddique smugly declares voters are "satisfied with the relief they are getting" and Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) candidate Ramesh Sharma …
GREEN issues came to the fore in several colonies of Delhi. But, for inexplicable reasons, metropolis-wide environmental issues such as the rapidly increasing air pollution, were ignored. Some of the city's otherwise articulate middle-class even accepted the problem of vehicular pollution as fait accompli. Says O P Sharda, president of …
ONE RARE case of an environmental issue spreading out and influencing an election campaign in two constituencies is that of Betwa river pollution in Madhya Pradesh. The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) candidate for Vidisha and the Congress candidate for nearby Sanchi tried to cash in on the issue, cleverly using …
PARTY manifestoes have repeatedly shown that election promises come cheap. Green ones may come even cheaper. The Congress party's environmental concerns have been stressed in its election manifestoes since the mid-1970s. However, that has not stopped the party from presiding over heavy exploitation of India's forests and groundwater. Now, it …
The Bhopal High Court has pulled up the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) for "lack of seriousness" in handling criminal proceedings against Union Carbide Corporation (UCC), whose negligence caused the Bhopal gas leak in 1984. In a three-and-a-half page order given on September 27, chief judicial magistrate Anil Kumar Chaturvedi …
The Union and Madhya Pradesh governments have been ruled culpable by a Rome-based tribunal of violating the rights of the victims of the Bhopal gas tragedy. The Permanent People's Tribunal (PPT) based its ruling on hearings conducted in October 1992 in Bhopal. The PPT ruling noted the failure of industry …
THE CLAIMS courts set up in Bhopal's gas leak-affected areas are rejecting more than half the compensation claims for death due to lack of evidence. Of the 40 courts that were to be set up, only 17 are functioning and have settled to date 396 cases involving disbursement of Rs …
In the early hours of Moday, Dec 3,1984, a toxic cloud of methyl isocyanate (MIC)gas enveloped the hundreds of shanties and huts surrounding a pesticide plant in Bhopal, India. Later, as the deadly cloud slowly drifted in the cool night air through streets in surrounding sections, sleeping residents awoke, coughing, …
In addition to the large-scale loss of life and continuing health problems experienced by the victims of the Bhopal disaster, a major casualty has been the lack of information. Compared to other major chemical disasters in the world, Bhopal has the dubious distinction of not only being the worst, but …
THE SUPREME Court recently ordered that one lakh people be paid interim relief of Rs 200 per month. The total amount these victims will get as interim relief of Rs 7,200 for which they need a pass book issued by the State Gas Relief Department. Touts operating in collusion with …
ON OCTOBER 16, 1992, the Supreme Court directed the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) to make Rs 1,482 crore available to Madhya Pradesh gas relief commissioner K Shankaranarayan for doling out to the victims of the 1984 Bhopal gas leak. But for the victims, who have waited three years since …
IF LIVING proof is needed of how institutions created by human beings for their welfare really work, one has only to go to Bhopal, where thousands succumbed in a deadly MIC gas leak on the night of December 2-3 in 1984. Eight years later, apathy, arrogance and greed still prevail …
After years of inaction, things seem to be moving with lightning speed in Bhopal. The Supreme Court has directed the Reserve Bank of India to transfer the money paid by Union Carbide as compensation to welfare commissioner A G Qureshi for payment to victims after the processing of claims. Almost …
THE RECENT ammonia gas leak in a Haryana factory claimed 11 lives ans brought back the nightmare of the Union Carbide (UC) and Shriram gas leaks. Now, as the eighth anniversary of the UC disaster in Bhopal draws near, some questions remain: How were the victims compensated? What roles did …
SEEING Beyond Genocide again after four years can bring back the anger and frustration one felt when visiting Bhopal shortly after the Union Carbide gas leak and wandering through JP Nagar and the MIC ward of Hamidia Hospital. In 1988, Doordarshan declared that a film on this unending tragedy was …
