The Bhopal gas tragedy verdict was a “downright injustice to the memory of those killed” and the Congress party must apologise to the nation for its “inability to deliver justice to the affected,” BJP national spokesperson Ravi Shankar Prasad said here on Thursday.
“Warren Anderson [the then Union Carbide chairman], who arrived on December 7 [1984], four days after the tragedy, was let out of the country within hours. It is a cruel joke played at the expense of the 15,000 people, who were killed due to the horrific leak,” said Mr. Prasad. Arjun Singh, Congress Chief Minister at the time of the tragedy, was “conspicuously silent today,” he pointed out
Mr. Prasad said, “Why is it that foreign nationals like Quattrocchi [accused in the Bofors scam] and Anderson have been allowed to get away with their crimes whenever there has been a Congress ruled government at the helm? Why is the Congress quiet now? ”
Commenting on the “mysterious phone call” that allegedly helped Anderson to get away, Mr. Prasad said the former Congress Chief Minister of Madhya Pradesh, Digvijay Singh, had hinted at “U.S. pressure hampering the proceedings of the case.”
Referring to U.S. President Barack Obama's statement that he would act tough against those responsible for the British Petroleum (BP) oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico in which some workers were killed, Mr. Prasad said the U.S. must cooperate with India in ensuring that justice was delivered in the Bhopal case.
The BJP was fully willing to support the Union government in amending the law and passing a legislation that would help prevent corporate offenders get away lightly with their crimes, he added.
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