Bhopal Gas Tragedy: Forty Years of Struggle for Justice—Part Two

Read Part 1 here.

Hurdles were created not only for proper medical treatment of the gas victims but also to prevent an estimate of the actual magnitude and gravity of the impact of the disaster on living beings and the environment.

For purposes of short- and long-term rehabilitation, a house-to-house survey was undertaken to build up the family profiles of those affected by the disaster. The Tata Institute of Social Work (TISS), Mumbai, assisted the government of Madhya Pradesh in carrying out this task. TISS also coordinated the work of nine other schools of social work, which were engaged in the same task.

Besides TISS, the other institutions that took part in the survey are the Indore Schools of Social Work (Devi Ahilya Vishwa Vidyalaya); the Karve Institute of Social Service (Pune University); Faculty of Social Work (Baroda University); College of Social Work (Bombay University); Tirpude College of Social Work (Nagpur University); Institute of Social Work (Nagpur University); Department of Social Work, Centre for Studies in Rural Development, Ahmednagar College, (Pune University); the Department of Social Work (Kashi Vidyapith); and College of Social Work (Osmania University, Hyderabad).

The volunteer teams consisting of 474 students and 65 faculty members conducted a detailed survey from January 1, 1985 to February 12, 1985, covering all the localities of 10 wards of Bhopal and a few localities in six other wards and completed 25,294 family interviews.

For some inexplicable reason, the state government abruptly wound up this vital household survey and no attempt was made to complete the task in the six partially surveyed wards or to undertake the task in the other 20 wards of Bhopal that had been declared as gas-affected.

Later, however, the government of India, in an affidavit in writ petition (civil) nos. 843 of 1988 and 11708 of 1985, admitted before the Supreme Court of India on March 12, 1990, “Based on estimated population figures, it would appear that there were about 5 lakh [500,000] people in the area on the night of the disaster and all these people need to be assisted through the scheme of interim relief.”

In other words, the TISS-led survey had at best covered less than one-fourth of all the gas-affected families. Since the pro forma sheets of the survey were confiscated by the state government, a proper analysis of even the truncated survey has never been published to date. It is just unbelievable that the government was so desperate to conceal the actual magnitude and gravity of the impact of the disaster!

Disappointed by the delay on the part of the government of Madhya Pradesh in analysing the data of the survey, in a letter dated July 22, 1985 and addressed to Mr Ishwar Das, the then relief commissioner, the then director of TISS, Dr A.S. Desai, wrote:

“I shall be grateful if you could let us know at the earliest how far the data were analysed and the relief programmes which have commenced for the specific families, women and children identified by the survey. We had offered to assist in the setting up of the implementation machinery also. Nothing has been heard in that respect either.”

However, the letter did not evoke any response. Dejected by the totally indifferent attitude of the state government, TISS later prepared a Brief Report on Gas Relief Work. The report, dated May 31, 1989, concluded as follows: “To this day, we do not know whether the data were analysed and utilised. Ten institutions gave their time at considerable cost to their academic work…

“Students and faculty willingly gave up this time from their vacation because they felt they were working for a cause…. They [the students] as well as faculty are very disappointed and have lost faith in the [Madhya Pradesh] government for the lack of response to the hard work put in for two months to cover 25,295 families at the minimal cost of second-class concession railway fare, simple food and absolutely inadequate living arrangements.

“No one expected anything more except that the people will be benefited by this stupendous volunteer census work. The disenchantment with the way in which the matter has been handled is difficult to describe.”

Public enquiry scuttled

Immediately after the disaster, the government of India, on December 5, 1984, set up a scientific committee headed by Dr S.Varadarajan, the then director general of the Council for Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR— the premier national institution for industrial research in India), to study the scientific and technical aspects of the disaster and prepare a report.

A day later, the government of Madhya Pradesh, on December 6, 1984, instituted a judicial probe into the disaster and appointed Justice N.K. Singh, a sitting judge of the Madhya Pradesh High Court, as the single member of the Bhopal Poisonous Gas Leakage (1984) Inquiry Commission.

On that same day, a team of experts from the UCC, US also arrived in Bhopal to investigate the cause of the gas leak. Several teams of Indian scientists and technologists with expertise in environmental protection and toxicology as well as social workers, who came forward to assist in the relief work, too trickled into Bhopal.

A team from the Delhi Science Forum (DSF) was among them. Subsequently, on December 18, 1985, Shri P.N. Haksar (former principal secretary to Prime Minister Indira Gandhi and the then president of DSF, released the DSF report on the disaster at a press conference held in Delhi.

The Justice N.K. Singh Commission, which began its sittings, directed the state government on March 26, 1985, to file the statement of the case. Among those who took part in the proceedings were the government of Madhya Pradesh; UCIL; Union Carbide Workmen’s Union; Union Carbide Karmachari Sangh; Zahreli Gas Khand Sangharsh Morcha (ZGKSM); Lawyers Collective; DSF; Bharatiya Mazdoor Sangh (BMS); Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP); Communist Party of India (CPI); Communist Party of India (Marxist); and several individuals, including journalists such as Rafat Ali Khan and Anees Chisti.

In the Order issued after the ninth sitting of the Justice N.K.Singh Commission on July 23, 1985, the commission ruled: “The UCIL … is the prima facie guilty party, responsible for the accident, resulting in the deaths and disablement of a vast number of the Indian people…” However, due to the lackadaisical attitude of the state government, the enquiry did not make much headway.

Finally, after much prevarication, on November 28, 1985, the government of Madhya Pradesh filed the statement of the case before the Justice N.K.Singh Commission without the list of witnesses and the list of documents.

While the list of witnesses proposed to be examined by the state government was filed on November 29, 1985, the government counsel requested some more time to file the list of documents.

The UCIL also requested more time to file the UCIL list of witnesses and list of documents. Justice Singh granted time to the parties till December 11, 1985 to file all the necessary documents. Before adjourning the next lap of sitting to December 12, 1985, Justice Singh made the following observation:

“However, before parting, I would like to stress that the commission proceedings have been delayed up to now mainly due to delay in filing the statement of case by the state government and the delaying tactics adopted by certain parties, taking advantage of the situation.

“It is insisted that the pleading stage must be completed by December 13, 1985, so that proceedings can be fixed for evidence in the month of January next year. No delay in this regard will be tolerated any further.”

On December 12, 1985, the state government filed the list of documents relied on. That same day, the UCIL also filed the list of witnesses and the list of documents relied on. But to the utter dismay of the gas victims and all concerned people, the government of Madhya Pradesh, which had prevaricated in its submissions till December 12, 1985 (i.e., for more than a year after the commission was set up), terminated the commission fraudulently on December 17, 1985, thereby, pre-empting the inquiry.

To this day, the magnitude, gravity and ramifications of the Bhopal gas leak disaster on living beings and the environment have not been thoroughly investigated.

Varadarajan Committee report

Meanwhile, the Varadarajan Committee had been entrusted with the additional task of supervising the neutralisation of the remaining amount of MIC (about 23 tonnes) that had been stored in two other adjacent storage tanks to the one from which MIC had escaped.

The neutralisation process was successfully carried out from December 16–22, 1984 with the assistance of the arrested officials of the UCIL, who had been granted bail for the purpose.

Thereafter, following extensive investigations, the Varadarajan Committee, which had inquired into the scientific and technical aspects of the Bhopal disaster, submitted its Report on Scientific Studies on the Factors Related to Bhopal Toxic Gas Leakage to the Union government on December 20, 1985.

The report pointed out the following design, maintenance and operational defects:

1.) “MIC is a highly reactive, toxic volatile and inflammable chemical… Since the reaction is exothermic, contamination of MIC with traces of the catalysts can cause violent reactions… MIC with the above-mentioned characteristics should be considered as an explosive in addition to it being a highly toxic chemical.”(Para 4.1, p.75).

2.)  “As per the UCC brochure, the storage temperature should be maintained below 15^oC and preferably at about 0^oC.” (Para 4.1, p.75)

3.) “The contents of the tank were being stored at ambient temperatures, which varies approximately from +15^oC to +40^oC at Bhopal. (Para 4.4, p. 77)

4.) “In retrospect, it appears the factors that led to the toxic gas leakage and its heavy toll existed in the properties of the very high reactivity, volatility and inhalation toxicity of MIC. The needless storage of large quantities of the material in very large size containers for inordinately long periods as well as insufficient caution in design, choice of materials of construction and in provision of measuring and alarm instruments, together with inadequate controls on systems of storage and on quality of stored materials as well as lack of necessary facilities for quick effective disposal of material exhibiting instability, led to the accident.” (Para 4, p.82)

Assessing the magnitude of the disaster and the gravity of its impact on life systems and the environment, or identifying the guilty were not within the terms of reference of the Varadarajan Committee. On the other hand, the purported objectives of constituting the Justice N.K.Singh Commission were for addressing those very issues.

However, the commission was prematurely disbanded by the state government precisely to prevent it from making a fair assessment of the extent and severity of the impact of the disaster and from establishing the onus of responsibility. Apparently, the Union and state governments were only interested in burying the matter somehow and had little interest in ensuring justice for the gas victims.

Krishna Murti Commission

On August 1, 1985, Indira Jaising of the Lawyers Collective filed writ petition no. 11708 of 1985 in the Supreme Court of India on behalf of Dr Nishit Vohra and others pleading for better medical care for gas victims and a proper epidemiological survey to determine the magnitude and gravity of the impact of the injuries sustained due to the disaster.

It was only thereafter that the government of India, through a gazette notification dated August 8, 1885, decided to set up a high-level commission under Dr C.R. Krishna Murthi (then director, Indian Institute of Toxicology Research, Lucknow) to study the long-term effects of MIC (and other toxic gases that escaped from the UCIL plant) on human, animal and plant life systems in and around Bhopal.

Established by the cabinet secretariat, it was called the Scientific Commission for Continuing Studies on Effects of Bhopal Gas Leakage on Life Systems.

Some of the most significant observations, findings and recommendations from the report of the Krishna Murti Commission, which was submitted in July 1987, are as follows:

1.) “The Indian scientific community has the moral responsibility to document all information of scientific interest on the Bhopal disaster and share the same with their compeers all over the world.” (p.1)

[Contrary to this recommendation, reports of the medical research undertaken by the ICMR were made public only as late as 1994.]

2.) “Data on the pregnancy outcome of 2,566 pregnant women (out of 2,894) reported to be pregnant on December 2–3, 1984) showed a spontaneous abortion rate of 24.2 percent (national average is reported to be 6-7 percent)… The stillbirth rate after the disaster was 33.7 per thousand, whereas the national figure for this index is 11.3 per thousand deliveries.” (p.7)

3.)  “It was realised right from the beginning that the health surveillance programme had to cover the entire population of the areas which bore the direct impact of the toxic cloud.” (p.8)

4.) “Surveillance of the immunological status of the exposees, both adults and children, is, therefore, essential for evaluating the prognosis of those who continue to suffer and also for monitoring increased susceptibility to environmental infections and hazards.” (p.11)

5.) “Exploratory studies sponsored by ICMR revealed that 22 percent of the patients attending various clinics in Bhopal suffered from mental disorders. A subsequent survey of 6,000 people by two sets of tests showed a prevalence rate of 66–133 per thousand as compared to 25 per thousand in a population not exposed to the gas. The majority of patients were females and more than 80 percent of cases were seen in the age group below 45 years. More than 90 percent of the cases could be categorised as neurotics.” (p.11) 

6.) “The progress of the epidemiological programme mounted in Bhopal has been tardy and suffers from many inadequacies in the design and the infrastructure for implementation. The operation of a peer review system to evaluate the work and apply mid-term corrections seems to be conspicuous by its absence.” (p.11)

7.) “It is recommended, therefore, that the ministry of health with the assistance of ICMR and other agencies creates the requisite mechanism for high-level coordination and monitoring of long-term health studies of the Bhopal Gas Victims.” (p.26)

Contrary to these observations and recommendations of the Krishna Murti Commission, neither the Union health ministry, nor the ICMR or the state government has to date created any mechanism for proper medical surveillance of the entire gas-exposed population or to maintain their complete computerised medical records.

In the absence of proper and complete medical records for all these years, gas victims have not only been denied proper and adequate medical care but also have been denied adequate compensation in accordance with the degree of injury and the trials and tribulations each of them has had to suffer.

Read Part 1 here.