India’s New Regime Blasts Payout for Bhopal Disaster

The new government said today its predecessor was wrong to agree to absolve Union Carbide of criminal liability in the 1984 Bhopal gas disaster, and it called the $470-million settlement inadequate.

Justice Minister Dinesh Goswami said the 6-week-old government of Prime Minister V. P. Singh would support gas victims and activists in Supreme Court petitions challenging the right of former Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi’s government to settle the case. However, Goswami did not say whether the government would try to reopen legal proceedings.

On Feb. 15, the Supreme Court accepted the $470-million settlement from the multinational Union Carbide as “full and final compensation” for the gas leak that killed at least 3,598 people and injured 20,000 in the central Indian city of Bhopal. The court also ruled that the firm, based in Danbury, Conn., was freed from criminal liability and any future claims arising from the disaster on Dec. 3, 1984.

“An important point made in the review petitions is that . . . India has no authority or right to arrive at a settlement which extinguishes all rights of the affected victims in respect of criminal liability,” Goswami said at a news conference.

“The government is also of the view that human life in India is not so cheap that the worst industrial disaster of the world . . . could be compensated by an amount of $470 million,” he added.

Goswami said the new government will make an interim relief payment to gas victims.

The Indian government has said Union Carbide was negligent in allowing the gas leak. The multinational corporation said the leak was the result of sabotage by a disgruntled employee.

Gas victims and activist groups challenged the settlement, claiming that the Gandhi government had no right to declare itself the sole representative of all claims arising from the disaster. On Dec. 22, the Supreme Court ruled that the government did have the right.