India Calls Bhopal Accord Unacceptable

The Indian government today described as “totally unacceptable” Union Carbide’s tentative agreement with private lawyers to pay $350 million to victims of the Bhopal gas disaster--a fund that, paid over time, could reach $600 million.

“Union Carbide is taking every step to ensure that the case is settled for a very low amount,” a written statement from the Ministry of Chemicals and Fertilizers said.

“The government has not endorsed any settlement on the lines reported in the press. The amount of settlement is inadequate and has always been so and is therefore totally unacceptable,” the statement said.

Several U.S. lawyers went to India immediately after the December, 1984, gas leak to sign up victims and their survivors as clients. The leak killed an estimated 2,000 people and injured 200,000 others.

India enacted special legislation in February of 1985 making the government the sole representative able to file a lawsuit in the United States on behalf of victims of the world’s worst industrial accident.

Government Role

Earlier today, a ministry spokesman in a statement read over the telephone reiterated that only the government could represent the victims.

The Danbury, Conn.-based Union Carbide Corp. announced Sunday that it had reached a tentative settlement of damage and injury claims. (Story on Page 7.)

The agreement “was worked out with some of the most prominent of the plaintiffs’ lawyers in the United States,” said Harvey Cobert, Carbide media relations manager.

The disaster occurred Dec. 2-3, 1984, at Carbide’s pesticide plant in central India when tons of lethal methyl isocyanate gas leaked out and engulfed the slums surrounding the factory.