South Asia Citizens Web

The National Alliance of People’s Movements is shocked and enraged at the recent judgement on Bhopal that not only comes 26 years too late but also makes a complete mockery of the concept of justice and the value of human lives.

This morning roads within a mile of the court were barricaded, public gatherings were banned, and police with batons were out in force. People who had waited 26 years for justice gathered in the streets to await the verdict pronounced on the Indian accused. Reports that all the defendants had been found guilty produced short-lived joy, but news of the sentences left the crowds shocked, disbelieving, disgusted, angry.

Built into the economic dogma of growth first is the ingrained notion held by large segments of the India’s elite that the fabric of inequality is meant to remain unimpaired.

The causes for Bhopal gas leak from the Union Carbide plant in 1984 can be traced to low product sales that made the company disinvest in safety and environmental systems. Events that panned out after the accident—government apathy, poor health and economic rehabilitation effort, no spill cleanup, Carbide’ s doublespeak and liability dodging—tantamount to denial of care and justice for the accident victims and are a consequence of low value of life in India and the US, and difference in price of life in the two countries. To achieve the same standard of social justice for all humans, we need to fight for a uniform high value of life, as a fundamental human right, throughout the world.

[India’s] Central government’s professed commitment to human rights is worth nothing so long as it won’t allow the soldiers indicted for murdering innocent civilians in Kashmir to be prosecuted for their crimes.