Union Carbide built the pesticide factory in Bhopal, India in the 1970s

On 2nd October, the Association for India's Development, Minnesota chapter (AID-MN) screened a movie on the Bhopal gas tragedy at the U of M. ICJB activist Ryan Bodanyi was present and fielded a discussion. Following is an account of the issue in his own words.

On 3rd December 1984, poison gas leaked from a Union Carbide factory, killing thousands. How many, no one knows. Carbide says 3,800. Municipal workers who picked up bodies with their own hands for burial in mass graves or cremation on mass pyres, reckon they shifted at least 15,000 bodies. Such body counts become meaningless when one knows that the dying has never stopped.

Union Carbide built the pesticide factory in Bhopal, India in the 1970s. Sales never met the company's expectations, and the plant ceased active production in the early 1980s. Tanks in the factory continued to hold over 60 tons of methyl isocyanate (MIC). The management allowed the plant's elaborate safety system to fall into disrepair. Every safety system -at least six in all-that had been installed to prevent a leak of MIC ultimately proved inoperative.

On the night of December 2nd, when an employee was flushing a corroded pipe, multiple stopcocks failed and allowed water to flow freely into the largest tank of MIC. This led to an uncontrolled reaction; the tank was blown out of its concrete sarcophagus and spewed its contents into a deadly cloud that hugged the ground. Blown by the prevailing winds, this cloud settled over much of Bhopal.

Remembers Aziza Sultan, a survivor: "At about 12.30 am I woke to the sound of my baby coughing badly. In the half light I saw that the room was filled with a white cloud. I heard a lot of people shouting… 'run, run'. Then I started coughing with each breath seeming as if I was breathing in fire." Another survivor, Champa Devi Shukla, remembers "It felt like somebody had filled our bodies up with red chilies, our eyes tearing, noses were watering, we had froth in our mouths."

In those apocalyptic moments no one knew what was happening. Many died in the stampedes through unlit narrow lanes. "The force of the human torrent wrenched children's hands from their parents' grasp," reported the Bhopal Medical Appeal in 1994. People simply died in the most hideous ways. "People were reduced to near blindness. The gases burned the tissues of their eyes and lungs and attacked their nervous systems. People lost control of their bodies. Urine and feces ran down their legs. Women lost their unborn children as they ran, their wombs spontaneously opening in bloody abortion."

Since the disaster, survivors have been plagued with an epidemic of cancers, menstrual disorders and what one doctor described as "monstrous births." The gas-affected people of Bhopal continue to succumb to injuries sustained during the disaster, dying at the rate of one each day.

Both Union Carbide and its new owner Dow Chemical claim the data on toxic effects of MIC is a "trade secret," frustrating the efforts of doctors to treat gas-affected victims. The site itself has never been cleaned up-studies report that soil and water in and around the plant are heavily contaminated by organochlorines, mercury, and lead. These chemicals are also found in the breast milk of women living near the plant. The children of gas-affected women are subject to a frightening array of debilitating illnesses, including retardation, birth defects, and reproductive disorders.

In 1989 Union Carbide, in a partial settlement with the Indian government, agreed to pay out $470 million in compensation. The victims weren't consulted and many felt cheated by their compensation-- $300-$500, or about five years' worth of medical expenses. Today, those who were awarded compensation are hardly better off than those who weren't. Victims of the gas attack eke out a perilous existence; 50,000 Bhopalis can't work due to their injuries and some can't even muster the strength to move. The lucky survivors have relatives to look after them; many survivors have no family left.

In 1991, the local government in Bhopal charged Warren Anderson, Union Carbide's CEO at the time of the disaster, with manslaughter. Mr. Anderson has since evaded an international arrest warrant and a summons to appear before a US court. For years his whereabouts were unknown, and it wasn't until August 2002 that Greenpeace found him, living a life of luxury in the Hamptons. Neither the American nor the Indian government seem interested in disturbing him with an extradition.

The Union Carbide Corporation, charged with culpable homicide, has refused to appear before an Indian court. Union Carbide remains liable for the environmental devastation its operations have caused ¾ environmental damages were never addressed in the 1989 settlement. U.S. and international corporate law dictate that these liabilities became the property of the Dow Corporation when it purchased Union Carbide in 2001. However Dow has consistently and stringently maintained that it isn't liable for the Bhopal disaster.

Together with international organizations such as Pesticide Action Network, Greenpeace, and Corpwatch, the survivors of the disaster have formed the International Campaign for Justice in Bhopal (ICJB). ICJB has made four demands of Dow Chemical:

1. Ensure that Union Carbide and Warren Anderson face trial in India, in accordance with the summons of Bhopal's Chief Judicial Magistrate.

2. Provide funding for long-term medical care, health monitoring and any necessary research studies, and release information on the leaked gases and their medical consequences

3. Clean up the contamination that Union Carbide left behind and provide a safe supply of drinking water to the community.

4. Provide income opportunities to victims that could not pursue their usual trade after their gas exposure.

The 20,000 people killed and 150,000 gas-affected make Bhopal the worst industrial tragedy in human history. The outcome of this struggle will have lasting implications for the environmental justice, corporate accountability, organized labor, and anti-globalization movements.

The $30-billion Dow Company spends more on lighthouse restoration, symphony orchestras, and collegiate seminars than it does on the people of Bhopal. If we allow corporations to evade the consequences of their actions, to wash their hands off a catastrophe to inflate already-bloated profit margins, where will it end? How many people will we let die before we take action? How many future Bhopals, and how much injustice are we willing to accept?

Students across the country have decided that Bhopal has waited too long for justice. Encouraged by the success of protests during the Vietnam War against Dow's production of napalm and Agent Orange, they've begun to organize against Dow's pollution of several communities such as Midland, MI; Plaquemine, LA; Seadrift, TX; and Newark, NJ. They've begun to frighten Dow by calling for their colleges and universities to divest from the company and refuse its donations until Dow accepts its moral and legal responsibilities in Bhopal. And they've begun to recognize the power they have when they unite and declare that the legacy of death must end.

Students from more than 20 colleges across the nation have formed Students for Bhopal, a coalition committed to pressuring Dow until it fulfills its obligations in Bhopal.

As Clayton Perry, at Occidental College in Los Angeles, says, "20,000 people have died. How can you turn your back on that?"

Visit www.studentsforbhopal.org and learn how to get involved in the campaign.
For more information about the tragedy, visit www.bhopal.net and www.bhopal.org.In a recent development, Nine U.S. Congressmen have filed an amicus brief on behalf of the victims. The brief, initiated by Mr. Pallone, comes in response to a March decision by a U.S. District Judge in New York dismissing all claims against the company.
A letter published in the October issue of JAMA (The Journal of the American Medical Association) gives results of a study conducted on adolescents among the affected population in Bhopal. It found significant selective growth retardation in boys, but not in girls, who were either exposed as toddlers to gases from the Bhopal pesticide plant or born to exposed parents.