Dow / Union Carbide off the hook on Bhopal?
“While everyone in the U.S. is currently talking about corporate financial crimes, there should be more open discussion about corporate crimes that kill people””In 1984, a Union Carbide factory in Bhopal, India, leaked a deadly gas because safety features were disabled as part of an effort to cut costs. Almost 18 years later, after 20,000 people have died, compensation money has not been fully distributed.”
“In a case to be decided this Wednesday, the Indian government, under pressure from Dow, is moving to drop the criminal charges and dilute the already paltry victims’ compensation fund by using it instead for cleanup — in effect making the victims pay. Two survivors and a medical worker are going into their 18th day of a hunger strike to demand just compensation and extradition of the CEO. One of the hunger strikers, Rashida Bi, lost five members of her family while the other, Tara Bai, lost the child she was carrying. If charges are dropped, it will establish a terrible precedent — that corporations can get away with murder.”
* NEIL TANGRI, ntangri@essential.org, www.bhopal.net
The author, Neil Tangri, is with Essential Action, an international anti-corporate campaigning group, and South Asians for Community Action.
For those interested in taking further action
1. Register protest of Indian government actions with the Indian ambassador to the United States. There is a form (with more info) at http://www.corpwatchindia.org/action/PAA.jsp?articleid=1843
2. Write to Dow and urge it to accept its legal liability for Carbide’s actions, to do more to provide for the victims, and to abandon its plans to introduce the toxic pesticide Dursban, banned by the EPA, into Indian households. A form is available at
http://www.dow.com/assistance/thoughts.htm.
