Demanding additional compensation for survivors and revision of the figures of disaster-related death and injury in the petition filed by the Centre with the Supreme Court, five women survivors of the Bhopal gas tragedy began a ‘waterless fast’ here on Tuesday.
Hundreds of survivors, a majority of them women, continued their dharna in Jantar Mantar with five organisations coming together to support their cause. The five women, who will continue their fast till the demands are met by the government, said that Prime Minister Narendra Modi and the Minister of Chemicals and Fertilizers were informed in September about this. “In 2010, the Group of Ministers on Bhopal decided to pay an additional compensation of Rs. 1 lakh, but left out as many as 93 per cent of the survivors without any scientific or legal reasons . We are calling upon this government to correct that and pay the additional compensation of Rs. 1 lakh to all those affected by the disaster,” said Rashida Bee, president of the Bhopal Gas Peedit Mahila Stationery Karamchari Sangh in a statement.
Balkrishna Namdeo of the Bhopal Gas Pedit Nirashrit Pensionbhogee Sangharsh Morcha said that as per the decision of the GoM on Bhopal, the Central government had filed a curative petition seeking additional compensation from Union Carbide and its current owner Dow Chemical in December, 2010. “But the figures of death and extent of injury caused to the victims were grossly downplayed,” he said.
Several of the survivors, who had assembled at the dharna, said that they were only awarded Rs. 25,000 as compensation. Satinath Sarangi of the Bhopal Group for Information and Action said, “We are waiting and watching over the reaction of the BJP government. We know that Mr. Modi is keen on inviting a lot of US corporations to invest here, but there should be adequate checks and balances in place so a tragedy like the Bhopal disaster will not recur.”
