Robbed of livelihood, denied justice and survival!

End Of Bhopal Protests?

GAS SURVIVORS HAVE BEEN TOLD TO CURTAIL THEIR PROTESTS AT DELHI'S JANTAR MANTAR

SATINATH SARANGI - Bhopal activist

FOR HUNDREDS of thousands of Bhopal residents robbed of their health and livelihood, denied their right to justice and the most basic means of survival, it has been 25 years of misery and suffering. As if this were not enough, Bhopal activists were recently told they could protest for a few hours only at Delhi's Jantar Mantar. "We don't care where you stay the night, but we will chase you away from Jantar Mantar after four," we were curtly informed by a policeman, his feet propped up on a table, when we sought permission for a protest starting April 15 at what has been the Capital's unofficial dissent centre. It's official now: pitching tents and overnight stays at Jantar Mantar have been banned because of the upcoming Commonwealth Games.

Just last month Prithviraj Chavan, Minister of State in the Prime Minister Office, was asked about the fate of the Empowered Commission on Bhopal to which he had agreed "in principle" (the Bhopal gas survivors had demanded an empowered panel that would have powers to implement rehabilitation projects and provide longdenied medical care). The minister said he couldn't recall what had happened to the panel.

What message are Chavan and the police sending out to the gas survivors? What must they do to ensure that 25 years of government promises are fulfilled? Not come to Delhi? Go into hiding? Pick up guns?

Twenty five years have passed since poisonous gases killed 8,000 people and injured half a million but the Centre is yet to take steps to bring the prime accused Union Carbide Corporation to trial. It officially holds Dow Chemical, which bought Union Carbide in 2001, responsible for cleaning up but looks the other way as Dow continues to sell its absconding subsidiary's technology in the country.

While our government is busy protecting the corporations responsible for the worst environmental crime in history, it utterly neglects the survivors and their children. In 2006, 55 survivors walked 800 km from Bhopal to Delhi to tell Prime Minister Manmohan Singh of the neglect and to ask him to set up an Empowered Commission. Instead, a Coordination Committee of government officials and survivors' representatives was set up. Not one of its decisions was implemented.

In 2008, frustrated survivors again marched to Delhi to demand an empowered panel. They camped on the pavements of Jantar Mantar for five months, braving summer storms and pouring rain, demanding proper medical care, jobs, support for families whose breadwinner had died as well as removal of the toxic waste. On May 29 that year, Chavan visited Jantar Mantar and agreed "in principle" to panel. On August 8, Minister of Chemicals and Fertilisers Ram Vilas Paswan said his ministry would draft and circulate to other ministries a proposal for the Empowered Commission. Since then, silence.

WHAT MESSAGE ARE MINISTER CHAVAN AND THE POLICE SENDING OUT TO THE PROTESTERS?

Not one of the 10,000 gas victims promised jobs in government rehabilitation centres has found employment. More than 20,000 people are still forced to drink contaminated groundwater despite a 2004 Supreme Court order that clean water be provided for all. A monitoring committee set up by the Supreme Court to investigate government hospitals in Bhopal wrote six reports detailing their utter shambolic failure. In its seventh report, the monitoring panel asked the court either to grant it powers or disband it as none of its recommendations had been implemented.

Peaceful attempts by survivors to remind the government of its unkept promises resulted in arrests, jail terms and beatings. Twenty-one survivors and their supporters spent 11 days in Tihar Jail where young men were physically tortured. Thirty-six people, including 12 children, were beaten inside Parliament Street police station. A formal complaint to the Police Commissioner produced no reply. No action has been taken against named police officials who punched two young girls, stripped a young boy and dragged women by their hair.

Bhopal survivors are used to battling great odds in their fight for justice. But being denied the right to stage (protracted) protests at Jantar Mantar deprives the movement of its lifeblood of publicity and its only way of ensuring that it remains in people's mind. This could yet be the killer blow.

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