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March 18, 2007
3-day solidarity fast for Bhopal outside Indian Embassy in Washington DC
NRIs Urge Acceptance of the Demands of the Bhopali Survivors on Hunger-Strike
Condemnation against Police Brutality on Nandigram Farmers
Washington DC - Solidarity fasts by over 10 volunteers with Association for India’s Development and Students for Bhopal are being held in front of the Indian Embassy for the next 3 days (16th to 18th March) in support of the survivors in Bhopal who despite being on their 12th day of an indefinite hunger strike demanding basic amenities like poison-free drinking water and access to competent medical care, are yet to hear from the Madhya Pradesh government. The MP government has dragged its feet in fulfilling a Supreme Court order to provide clean water and full federal funding for the project.
Concerned citizens and members of the Indian diaspora also held a vibrant protest outside the Indian Embassy in Washington DC at 4pm yesterday, demonstrating their outrage and alarm at the callousness and apathy of the governments of Madhya Pradesh and West Bengal and complete disregard for the life of the common citizen, as evinced from the recent happenings in Bhopal and Nandigram. The public fast starts this afternoon (~3-4:30pm) despite heavy rain and snow, fasters will sit in public at the Embassy each afternoon this weekend to demand action from the government. *** Contact Somu Kumar for exact location and times.***
The fasters in Washington DC are also strongly condemning the brutal killing of farmers in Nandigram, in an unprecedented act of inhuman violence unleashed by the state machinery on 14th March, 2007.
While the official estimate of the death toll at Nandigram is between 14 and 20, non-governmental sources on the ground are reporting that the death toll may have crossed 100. Many are reportedly missing and do not count in official death tolls. It is feared that several bodies may have been dumped in the sea so they cannot be identified.
Prof Mohan Bhagat, director of the Association for India’s Development and a faculty at the University of Maryland, says: “As Indians living in the diaspora we are truly hanging our heads in shame when people ask us what is wrong with India that claims to be a big player on the world scene but can only do so by spilling the blood of her own people?” He urges the Indian ruling elite to abandon all anti-people policies and devise methods that will lead to the betterment of the citizens from the bottom up.
Overwhelming concern and support for the Bhopali survivors has poured in from all corners of the world - over 2000 faxes have been sent to the Chief Minister of Madhya Pradesh, Mr Shivraj Singh Chouhan and over 350 phone calls made to various government offices in India, urging the government to accept the basic demands of the survivors.
Somu Kumar, a volunteer with Students for Bhopal, who is on a fast in Washington DC, says, "The fact that six Bhopal survivors are in a hunger-strike for last 11 days for the most basic of all needs -- clean-drinking water -- is appalling; more worrying is the fact that Madhya Pradesh Government is turning a blind-eye to their just demands. It makes me wonder whether we are living in a democracy."
In a separate petition to the Chief Minister of West Bengal which has received over 400 signatures in less than a day, the advocates are demanding an independent probe into the killings of farmers in Nandigram, withdrawal of police and armed party cadres from the area, and immediate action by the state government to economically rehabilitate the bereaved and the affected.
An outraged Arun Gopalan, president of the Maryland chapter of AID, comments: “While people in Bhopal are waiting for justice for the last 23 years, people in Nandigram are being killed so that they do not even exist to seek justice! Do we want India to shine with the blood of it own citizens? Is this the sort of development we want to see? ” Arun will also join the solidarity fast.
In Bhopal, on the 14th day of the "Jeene kaa Haq" (Right to Live) campaign led by four Bhopal Chemical Disaster Survivors organizations, 6 representatives of survivors of the world's worst industrial disaster started an indefinite fast on March 5th, demanding medical care, economic and social rehabilitation and protection from Union Carbide's poisons that have killed and maimed for 22 years. The survivors also work with those affected by ground water contamination from the abandoned Union Carbide factory site where the deadly 1984 accident occurred. Current Carbide owner Dow Chemical so far has refused to clean up the site. The hunger strikers include Goldman Environmental Prize winner Rashida Bee, who lost six family members to cancer, and herself suffers from chronic health problems ever since the disaster.
Posted by zinda at 08:38 AM | Comments (0)
March 05, 2007
"Green" conference at UC Berkeley recinds Dow sponsorship over Bhopal
On Tuesday, February 27, the UC Berkeley Energy Symposium announced that it was voiding its $50,000 sponsorship arrangement with Dow Chemical due to a student government resolution concerns Dow’s unresolved responsibilities in Bhopal, India, scene of the world’s worst-ever industrial disaster. The organizers cited a 2004 student government resolution for their decision, which called on the University to divest and reject donations from Dow until it cleaned up abandoned chemical waste left at the Bhopal factory site.
"We are very happy to hear of BERC's decision,” said Kamal Kapadia, a doctoral student at Berkeley. “This sends a clear message to Dow that it cannot continue to ignore the suffering it has inflicted on hundreds of thousands of people in Bhopal. Until the company takes full responsibility for its actions and meets the demands of the Bhopal survivors, all their attempts at greenwashing, like sponsoring this clean energy event, will be exposed and rejected for their deep hypocrisy."
Resolution #198 was passed in 2004 by the Associated Students of the University of California (ASUC), which represents Berkeley’s 33,000 students. Sponsored by a coalition of South Asian and environmental student groups, the resolution calls on the University of California to divest from Dow Chemical, the world’s second-largest chemical company, and refuse all donations from the company. Dow is a major donor to the University of California, Berkeley, with cumulative donations totaling $4.3 million as of October 2003.
In a statement emailed to UC Berkeley students and faculty, the conference organizers cited the Bhopal resolution as the basis for their decision. “In light of the ASUC resolution, the BERC leadership has decided that it is important to respect our organization’s role as a representative of the larger Berkeley student community. Therefore, BERC will abide by the ASUC resolution and not use Dow funding for the 2007 Berkeley Energy Symposium.”
The UC Berkeley Energy Symposium is organized by the Berkeley Energy & Resources Collaborative (BERC), and promises to “bring together 150 of Berkeley’s leading researchers in energy technology, economics, and policy with the top cleantech investors, industry experts, and entrepreneurs.” Scheduled speakers include Robert Birgeneau, the Chancellor of UC Berkeley and Commissioner Art Rosenfeld of the California Energy Commission. The conference will focus on the role of UC Berkeley in creating a sustainable energy future.
On December 3rd, 1984, thousands of people in Bhopal, India, were gassed to death after a catastrophic chemical leak at a Union Carbide pesticide plant. More than 150,000 people were left severely disabled—of whom 22,000 have since died of their injuries¬—in a disaster now widely acknowledged as the world’s worst-ever industrial disaster. Today, those who survived the gas remain sick, and the chemicals that Union Carbide left behind in Bhopal have poisoned the water supply and contributed to an epidemic of cancers, birth defects, and other afflictions. Since its purchase of Carbide in 2001, Dow Chemical has refused to clean up the site, which continues to contaminate those near it; fund medical care or livelihood regeneration; or present Union Carbide to face criminal charges of “culpable homicide” (manslaughter) from which it has been absconding since 1991.
Posted by zinda at 08:37 AM | Comments (0)
Indiana University students confront Dow CEO
In the cold morning of Feb 28th 2007, outside the RCA dome in downtown Indianapolis, a group of people from Association for India’s Development (AID) and Amnesty International held a protest against Mr. Andrew Liveris, CEO of DOW Chemicals, speaking at the 61st Conference for Energy and Environment.The conference hosted by the Kelley School of Business, Indiana University, was attended by over 1000 people including students and executives from various major corporations. The protestors held a banner “DOW clean up or shut up! Justice for Bhopal” which captures the irony of the CEO of Dow Chemicals, a company with a record of tarnishing the environment, preaching about energy and environment.
Since 2001, Dow Chemicals fully owns Union Carbide, which was responsible got the Bhopal gas tragedy in India. This gas leak caused by the total failure of the plant’s safety systems killed over 22,000 people and left behind an accident site where, even today, hundreds of thousands of people are being exposed to toxic wastes. The banner and posters held by the protestors attracted the attention of the conference attendees and several by-passers. The protestors also distributed flyers and spoke to several pedestrians about the Bhopal disaster and Dow chemicals’ involvement. Earlier in the month, representatives from AID and Amnesty International had expressed their concerns to the Dean of Kelly School of Business which had lead to invitations for the two groups to attend the conference and question Mr. Liveris directly.
Three members from AID and Amnesty were present inside the conference venue and made use of the Question & Answer session to ask Mr. Liveris about their role in Bhopal. Ms. Harini Gopalakrishnan, the spokesperson for AID and graduate student at Indiana University, described the plight of the 200,000 Bhopal victims in her question and asked if Dow will take any steps to shed its apathy. “[B]eing the CEO of the largest chemical company in the world and also the parent company of Union Carbide, I would like to know, what you would like to do about this (Bhopal) in the future”, Ms. Gopalakrishnan wanted to know. Mr. Liveris, calling it a tough question, declined all responibility on Dow Chemical for the disaster. “Union Carbide settled with the government of India, and the state Government of Madhya Pradesh, for four seventy million dollars in 1989….. it is really not the DOW chemical company’s responsibility at all”.
Mr. Tom Benner from Amnesty International countered Dow's position with a follow-up question referring Amnesty's 2002 report on the Bhopal disaster. Mr. Benner asked Mr. Liveris, “… [e]veryone here understands that when you purchase a company, you acquire all its assets, but also it liabilities. You talked about sending four seventy million dollars to the government of India. But with all due respect, I don’t think that’s sufficient. When I was a child, my parents taught me that when I made a mess, it was my job, my responsibility, to clean it up. Shouldn’t the same thing apply to corporations as well?”. Mr. Liveris was clearly irritated by the question and tersely reiterated his earlier position taking cover behind the limited settlement arrived at in the Indian courts. He added, “the settlement was justified and ... by the Supreme Court of India. So, I will again urge you to get on a flight to New Delhi, and ask exactly that question to the Government of India, who has access to four seventy million dollars from 1989.”. He failed to mention that the settlementwas only for the current victims of the disaster in 1989 and did not cover the cleanup of the accident site or the fallout of the toxic pollutants in the site on the health of thousands living in the Bhopal community.
Finally, Giri Krishnan, president of AID and graduate student at Indiana University, confronted Mr. Liveris on their using the law to justify their compensation yet not appearing in the Indian courts to face criminal charges. Mr. Krishnan said, “In 1991, the Supreme Court of India has reacted against Union Carbide 'culpable homicide' against the Union Carbide industry and Union carbide is right now, a fully subsidiary of DOW, and it has not shown up in the courts of India”, and went on to ask if Dow would put any pressure on Union Carbide to face trial and provide justice to the affected people. before Mr. Liveris could address their criminal liability, the moderator of the conference intervened saying the most people in the audience did not take the environmental issues raised on Bhopal seriously and that we move on to other questions. This was met with applause from the audience, which seemed to reflect the futility of tying environmental responsibility with business.
Despite Mr. Liveris failng to adequately answer the questions and the disinterest of the audience to environmental issues that were poisoning people in developing countries, the protest served to highlight to continued negligence of Dow Chemical to the Bhopal victims. The protestors attested that they would continue to fight for justice for the Bhopal victims and their actions against Dow would endure till the victims are rehabilitated.
Listen to the Q & A session:
Question & Answer #1 (Ms. Gopalakrishnan and Mr. Liveris)
Question & Answer #2 (Mr. Benner and Mr. Liveris)
Question & Answer #3 (Mr. Krishnan and moderator)
Posted by zinda at 08:32 AM | Comments (0)