On the 33rd anniversary of the Bhopal gas tragedy on Sunday, more than 500 victims and their supporters marched to the abandoned Union Carbide India Limited plant in protest against the negligence on the part of the government.
Hours of furious sloganeering culminated in burning of an effigy with the logo of the Union Carbide, Dow Chemical and DuPont. Numerous placards with slogans such as “No More Bhopal”, “33 Years Of Struggle For Justice And A Life of Dignity” were displayed.
Rashida Bi from the Bhopal Gas Peedit Mahila Stationery Karmchari Sangh said, “There were at least 500 people at the rally today [Sunday]. Our main demands are that the victims should get employment, the contaminated soil should be cleared, the women who lost their husbands should get a monthly pension and affected kids should be given proper treatment. The government has not responded to our protest yet.”
The list of demands released by the organisations that led the protest included proper medical care and punishment to the corporate criminals.
The protest in Bhopal was lead by five survivors’ organisations. The leaders of these groups accused the State and the Central governments with criminal neglect of the victims. The leaders also said the official apathy had increased after the BJP government came to power in 2014 because a large number of the victims were poor Muslim and the majority of the Hindu victims were from the depressed classes.
The aftermath of the tragedy continues to haunt the victims till today. Exposure to the deadly methyl isocyanate gas and other chemicals that had leaked from the factory in the early hours of December 3, 1984 led to one of the worst industrial disasters in the world.
