Ministerial panel on Bhopal for examination of Dow’s liability

NEW DELHI - The ministerial panel on the 1984 Bhopal gas tragedy has sought legal scrutiny of the possible criminal and civil liabilities of Dow Chemicals in the world’s worst industrial disaster, triggered by multinational Union Carbide Corporation, which Dow took over in 2001.

The ministerial panel, headed by Union Home Minister P. Chidambaram, has recommended scrutiny of Dow Chemical’s liability in its report submitted to Prime Minister Manmohan Singh June 21.

The report was made public for the first time Thursday by the ministry of chemicals and fertilisers as an annexure to a question on the Bhopal gas tragedy, posed to the ministry in the Lok Sabha.

“The ministry of chemicals and fertilisers and the CBI may be directed to file appropriate applications before the courts concerned and request them, specially the (Madhya Pradesh) High Court to expeditiously decide the question of the liability of Dow Chemicals and any other successor to UCC/UCIL,” said the report, submitted to the PMO.

“Once the question is decided, various legal proceedings involving Dow Chemicals and any other company or the person can be taken forward,” the ministerial panel on Bhopal gas tragedy opined in its report to the prime minister.

On the question of extradition of fugitive UCC chairman Warren Anderson, the report said: “CBI with the assistance of the ministries of law and the external affairs, in consultation with the Attorney General of India may be asked to gather additional material in support of the request for extradition.”

The panel also wanted the government to move the Supreme Court with a special curative petition to examine if the apex court’s ruling of Sep 13, 1996, which diluted the charges of graver offences like culpable homicide not amounting to murder, entailing ten years of jail term, could be revoked and graver offences could be restored in the case.

The panel also wanted the government’s order to the CBI to directly move the high court against the Bhopal magistrate’s ruling, which had convicted June 7 all the eight Indian accused, including former Union Carbide chairman Keshub Mahindra, for the instant deaths of over 3,500 people from the leakage of deadly methyl-iso-cyanate (MIC) gas from the company’s plant here on the intervening night of Dec 2-3, 1984.

The home minister-led panel also wanted to examine the feasibility of opening the question of compensation amount, settled to US $ 470 million by the apex court earlier.

For this, the panel wanted the government to ask the attorney general to examine the feasibility of filing another curative petition to the apex court.

A curative petition is an ultimate lawsuit which challenges an apex court ruling on the grounds of grave miscarriage of justice.

The ministerial panel in its report put the total number of deaths in the aftermath of the world’s worst industrial disaster at 5,295. It said a total of 3,199 people had been permanently disabled due to the gas leak, while 2,000 others suffered from cancer, 1,000 from renal failure and 33,672 from temporary disability.