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December 21, 2005

Doctors are humans too!

SALEEM NAIK, A DOCTOR AT THE BHOPAL MEMORIAL HOSPITAL ANSWERS CRITICS OF THE STRIKE. PICTURES ARE FROM TODAY'S DEMONSTRATION BY GAS VICTIMS IN SUPPORT OF THE STRIKING HOSPITAL STAFF.

Survivors organisations arrive at the scene of the protest

The other day there was a column in the Hindustan Times about the Hippocratic oath. The respected columnist had written that doctors had forgotten their pledge and were working against the basic principle of their fraternity. Their agitation had led to a lot of problems to the patients. It also wrote that the doctors were fighting for money and the patients had to bear the brunt of their actions. With due respect and regards to the senior columnist I feel I would be failing in my duty if I don't reply to the various questions that were raised by him.

Doctors are not politicians. They are not even professional agitators. Their temperament demands that they be somber and caring ladies and gentlemen with high tolerance. But they are humans too! There is a limit to their tolerance. One of our residents was working round the clock, assisting 2 cardiac surgeries a day, sleeping in the ICU, and he did it not for 48 or 72 hours but for 1 and a half months. Do you feel that he should be relieved of his duty for a couple of days? Does he have the right to live and fulfill the responsibilities of being a son and a father also? The hospital administration doesn't think so. He is not paid anything extra for his efforts and the administration on the other hand, frames rules and conditions to make his working conditions more miserable. His contract conditions are changed in retrospect. When he goes with his problems to the Director General, the DG makes him wait for 2 hours and in the end doesn't see him because he is busy in his research work. The poor fellow cannot talk to the trust or the trustees, as the Chairman has issued a circular stating that any such act would be considered to be an act of indiscipline. What can he expect from a trustee who calls him a 'chaprasi' in front of the media? How many of you would like to be in his place? Is it wrong, if he has decided to protest?

The number of patients seeking healthcare in BMHRC has increased exponentially, whereas the number of sanctioned posts remains the same. As compared to the year 2000, when we saw 27,000 patients, in 2004, the figures have gone upto 1,18,000. Due to these factors the existing staff has to work under a lot of stress and many of the employees have quit their jobs and left for other hospitals. This has resulted in a severe crisis of the staff in this hospital. 60 doctors have resigned from a single department in the last 4 years. The Cardiology ward had to be shut down, for more than one and a half month, due to shortage of staff. The senior resident doctors, who should have been 63, were not more than 25 in number when our agitation started. Why this exodus of staff? Today a time has come when all of us have resigned en masse from the institute. We have all have put our careers at stake to make you realize that the hospital is dying a slow death and it can be saved only if we all join hands and fight against the wrongs in the administration and the trust.

Police await the protestors. The survivors are not daunted.

The trust which the Hon' Supreme Court made had Mr M N Buch, as its working trustee. The Supreme Court had specified that the working trustee should be one who has some administrative experience. We are all aware of the administrative achievements and integrity of Mr Buch, who is probably the finest administrator, our state has ever produced. After Mr Buch resigned from his post, due to personal reasons, Mr A A Siddique, a criminal lawyer, was appointed to be the working trustee by the trustees themselves, with no directions from the Hon' Supreme court. Now, with no offence to him, Mr Siddique has no administrative experience what so ever to run even a dispensary or a departmental store, let alone a 330-bedded state of art super specialty institute, with over 500 professionally qualified employees. The hospital administration which was already handicapped by an unconcerned and inefficient Director General, who is only concerned about diverting crores of rupees into his research, which has nothing to do with the gas or the gas victims (again a violation of the directions of the Supreme Court!), got a further handicap of a selfish local trustee. The car in which Mr Siddique moves about is paid by the trust, his chauffer and his domestic helps get their salaries from the hospital, his mobile bill, phone, fax and various other expenses are paid by the trust, which was made to be a custodian of the gas victim's money. It would be appropriate to note here that the Supreme Court has clearly directed that no trustees would take any personal benefits or perks from the trust, in any way. The hospital for them is like a hen that lays golden eggs, and they would rather sacrifice their honour, their cause but not their selfish desires and it is them who worship Mammon blindly.

Some of the workers in this hospital are made to sign blank pay receipts and they are paid less than half the amount of money than, the basic minimum wages, which the state specifies. Their provident fund and health insurance is shared between the administrators and the contractors. This matter was taken up to the Chief Minister's office as well but neither the hospital administration nor the state government did anything.(And Mr Zamiruddin sahib talks about Lokayakut!) It was only after the employees caught the contractor red handed and threatened him with dire consequences that a part of this irregularity could be stopped. Though it is yet to be over and the hospital administration has not done anything at all to stop it. Is it wrong if someone protests?

The hospital was made to serve the gas victims. In none of the directions given by the Hon' Supreme Court of India, has the trust been directed to treat any other patients but the gas victims. The hospital figures for the year 2005 show that every third patient who is admitted in the hospital is a paid patient. (Admitted Paid patients :Gas victims, 2308:5730) It's an open secret that these patients get preferential treatment in the hospital. In an already understaffed hospital where the staff is overburdened with work, preferential care of the private patient automatically means neglect for the gas victim. The administration has different rules for the Gas victim and the paid patients. For instance for getting an MRI done, the gas victim patient would get a date of two months, whereas the paid patient could get it done on the same day. Final reports in form of images or films of important investigations like angiographies, endoscopies, CT scan and MRI are not given to the gas victim patients but the paid patients can have them. If a gas victim needs them, he has to pay for it. He has to pay for not the CD or the film but for the entire investigation, as they say, he has to be treated like a private patient!! Its ironical that a centre which was made to only serve the gas victims has derailed from it's very objective and has been converted into a money making machine. The local trustee and the hospital administration are entirely responsible for this. We wish that the oppressed gas victims would come forward and fight for their rights so that the doctors could do what they are supposed to do.

Six months back there was an agitation in the hospital and when the inefficient administration had no clues of how to overcome the crisis, they decided to ruin the place. The hospital was locked up and the admitted gas victims, as well as the residential staff were asked to vacate the hospital premises within 48 hours. Patients were thrown out and 3 lives were lost. The entire city protested and they had to withdraw the notices and open up the locks but can they make those three people live again? We thought that that it was a wake up call for the sleeping administration and the dictatorial trust. But it seemed otherwise. The administration continued to sleep and so that the cries of our agony would not disturb them, they gagged us with the Essential Services Maintenance Act (ESMA), which was initially clamped for 3 months and then further extended for another 3 months. It should also be remarked here that the Chairman had given us a written assurance that he would solve most our major issues in a time duration "not exceeding one month" and it was in apprehension that of a retaliation that he used all his influence and clout to impose ESMA and then further extend it, as well. There is a judgment ( B.R. Singh case versus Union of India1989), the Hon Chairman, Justice A M Ahmadi, gave when he was a judge in the Hon' Supreme Court which reads that, "Strike in a given situation is only a form of demonstration. There are different modes of demonstrations, e.g., go-slow, sit-in, work-to-rule, absenteeism, etc., and strike is one such mode of demonstration by workers for their rights. The right to demonstrate and, therefore, the right to strike is an important weapon in the armory of the workers. Almost all democratic countries have recognized this right." By imposing ESMA, he has shown that he has double standards, which are different when he has to decide for someone else and different when he has to decide for himself.

I feel as much for the agony of the gas victims, who are being denied treatment because of this turmoil, as anyone else but there also something else I feel still as strongly. Bhopal memorial hospital is not like any another hospital. It is a place that was built on the tombstones of over 20,000 victims of the gas tragedy. "Homage and hope", is our hospital's motto. Homage to those who died and hope for those who still suffer from chronic diseases due to MIC gas exposure in the worst ever industrial disaster in history. The cause of the agitation that is right now going on in the hospital, is that this promise, which was made by the Supreme Court of India to the Bhopal gas victims had been broken and some people were using the hospital resources to fulfill their own vested interests. We realise this fact that between the crossfire of the trust and the employees, it's the poor gas victims who are suffering but should then this terrorism of the trust be continued to go on? Who would stand up? We went to the state government who says it is not in its jurisdiction. The gas victims need to wake up. This is after all their hospital and for their welfare that we are agitating for.

The victims of the great tragedy were being victimized further by an inefficient administration of the hospital and the selfish trust that runs it. The very fact that the trust is chaired by ex Chief Justice Supreme Court of India has given it a shield of immunity from the entire Judiciary and the Government(And the columnist wants us to go to Lok Ayukta for that!!). There is no monitoring agency and no accountability over the functioning of the trust. The corpus fund, which is the main attraction, for all those corrupt people who are sticking to their seats with double seatbelts on, amounts to 375 crore rupees. It is an independent shielded organization with no judicial, administrative or public interference. The Supreme court of India appointed the monitoring committee to oversee the functioning of the hospital, from which the hospital excused itself claiming that as it's Chairman was an ex CJ, so it didn't require to be monitored at all!! Now the point to note is that if they had nothing to hide, then why did they excuse themselves from the monitoring committee. After all they have to be accountable as it is all public money, for which they have been made custodians.

We apologise to our patients who have to face the misery because of our agitation but we want them to realise that it is for them that this fight is on. The hospital where they turn to, when they are ill, has been taken up by a disease. The doctors have diagnosed the disease to be the corrupt and inefficient administration and the trust. It is only up to the patients to come forward and help us remove this disease from the hospital.

Mr Zamiruddin had raised some questions about the integrity of the doctors of BMHRC, here I would like to quote, "The Hippocratic oath", Dr B Dasgupta, Hindustan Times, UK edition, August 3, 2004 in which he writes "...Perhaps these errant doctors need to visit Bhopal Memorial Hospital to relearn what doctors should be like and why they are respected enough to worship the ground they walk on". The author whose father was given a new lease of life by the Bhopal Memorial Hospital team has voiced these views. I don't think more needs to be said about the integrity of the doctors of this hospital or their service towards their patients. I would also like to remark that the doctors working in this hospital could get 3-4 times the salary in any good corporate hospital in a metropolis and at least 2 times the salary, if they join any another private hospital in Bhopal. So any doubts that the doctors of this hospital even think of Mammon, leave aside worshipping him, should be put to rest.

Initial years of upbringing and education by our parents, before we went to the Medical College, made us gather a few principles, which we have not been able to forget. We could only reach this stage because we learnt to stand and walk. That is what made us reach the college and that is how we are, what we are today. They also taught us never to tolerate injustice! Fight against corruption! Fight for the rights of the poor and the deprived! Fight oppression! No write up by any columnist and no power on earth can make us give up our battle against greed and corruption. We are citizens of a country, whose national emblem has it engraved, 'Satya-mev-Jayate', TRUTH ALWAYS TRIUMPHS. I call upon all sons of the soil to help us fight and make sure that Truth Triumphs!!

Posted by bhola at 06:36 PM | Comments (0)

300 hospital staff fired from Bhopal Memorial Hospital

BHOPAL: 21 DECEMBER 2005

At least 300 employees, including about one hundred doctors of the 350-bed super speciality Bhopal Memorial Hospital and Research Centre, have been sacked following the expiry of a 24-hour ultimatum given by the management to the agitating staff to return to work.

Besides about 100 doctors, others whose service was terminated yesterday include nurses, technicians, supervisors, laboratory attendants, computer operators and others.

The management has initiated steps to recruit fresh replacements for the fired employees and has advertised vacancies inviting applications with a closing date of December 27, hospital spokesman Mazhar Ullah told UNI today.

Meanwhile, the management 'dropped' its plan to evict the terminated employees from the hospital quarters, who were served 24-hour notice, with some 150 employees tendering their apology and expressing their willingness to return to work. Another 100 employees were expected to give their apology by this evening, Mr Mazhar Ullah said.

The BMHRC was set up at a cost of around Rs 165 crores at the Supreme Court's directive to provide specialised treatment of the victims of the 1984 Bhopal gas tragedy. The hospital trust is headed by former Supreme Court Chief Justice A H Ahmadi.

The employees. who had tendered their resignations enmasse on 3 December to press their demand for pay reforms and removal of the trustees for alleged neglect of the gas victims, are still staging a sit-in at the hospital gate, where large numbers of police have also been deployed.

Six patients admitted to the intensive care unit were compulsorily discharged yesterday, a senior resident doctor said.

Taking cognisance of the agitation by the doctors and other employees of BMHRC, Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan has issued directives that alternative treatment facilities for the BMHRC patients be provided in different hospitals set up for the 1984 victims.

Of the 650 beds in about half a dozen hospitals in gas-affected localities, 300 beds would be kept reserved, official sources said.

Mr Chouhan also instructed the Health and Gas Relief departments to provide super speciality treatments like open heart surgery, neuro-surgery and nephrology test facilities to the gas victims at other hospitals.

Posted by bhola at 06:27 PM | Comments (0)

December 20, 2005

Public Enemy by Sinclair Lewis

Sinclair Lewis's 1935 novel 'It Can't Happen Here' envisioned an America in thrall to a homespun facist dictator. Newly reissued, it's as unsettling a read as ever.

THIS EXCELLENT REVIEW BY JOE KEOHANE IS SHAMELESSLY NICKED FROM "THE BOSTON GLOBE"

December 18, 2005

PICTURE THIS: A folksy, self-consciously plainspoken Southern politician rises to power during a period of profound unrest in America. The nation is facing one of the half-dozen or so of its worst existential crises to date, and the people, once sunny, confident, and striving, are now scared, angry, and disillusioned.

This politician, a "Professional Common Man," executes his rise by relentlessly attacking the liberal media, fancy-talking intellectuals, shiftless progressives, pinkos, promiscuity, and welfare hangers-on, all the while clamoring for a return to traditional values, to love of country, to the pie-scented days of old when things made sense and Americans were indisputably American. He speaks almost entirely in "noble but slippery abstractions" - Liberty, Freedom, Equality - and people love him, even if they can't fully articulate why without resorting to abstractions themselves.

Through a combination of factors - his easy bearing chief among them (along with massive cash donations from Big Business; disorganization in the liberal opposition; a stuffy, aloof opponent; and support from religious fanatics who feel they've been unfairly marginalized) - he wins the presidential election.

Once in, he appoints his friends and political advisers to high-level positions, stocks the Supreme Court with "surprisingly unknown lawyers who called [him] by his first name," declaws Congress, allows Big Business to dictate policy, consolidates the media, and fills newspapers with "syndicated gossip from Hollywood." Carping newspapermen worry that America is moving backward to a time when anti-German politicians renamed sauerkraut "Liberty Cabbage" and "hick legislators...set up shop as scientific experts and made the world laugh itself sick by forbidding the teaching of evolution," but newspaper readers, wary of excessive negativity, pay no mind.

Given the nature of "powerful and secret enemies" of America-who are "planning their last charge" to take away our freedom - an indefinite state of crisis is declared, and that freedom is stowed away for safekeeping. When the threat passes, we can have it back, but in the meantime, citizens are asked to "bear with" the president.

Sure, some say these methods are extreme, but the plain folks are tired of wishy-washy leaders, and feel the president's decisiveness is its own excuse. Besides, as one man says, a fascist dictatorship "couldn't happen here in America...we're a country of freemen!"

. . .

While more paranoid readers might be tempted to draw parallels between this scenario and sundry predicaments we may or may not be in right now, the story line is actually that of Sinclair Lewis's 1935 novel It Can't Happen Here, a hastily written cautionary note about America's potential descent into fascism, recently reissued by New American Library in a handsome trade edition with a blood-spattered cover design.

The book, though regarded as a departure for Lewis, bears all the trappings of the writer in his prime. Lewis made his name, and his fortune, writing scathing indictments of an America enamored of materialism and mediocrity in the prosperous '20s; he won America's first Nobel Prize for Literature for it. From Main Street to Babbitt, Arrowsmith to Elmer Gantry, there was no instance of egregious Rotarianism or middle-class hypocrisy he wouldn't gleefully assail. Lewis was so successful in these forays that the eponymous protagonist of Babbitt, whom Lewis held up as the embodiment of all that was wrong with middle-class America in the '20s, saw his name transformed into a widely used pejorative.

At its center, It Can't Happen Here is no different from these prior efforts. It's just carried out on a bigger, more hyperbolic scale: Lewis takes that Babbitt mentality - the entrenched incuriosity, the smug certitude, the conformity, the complacency - and combines it with the growing desperation of the times to envision an end of America as we know it.

It's an unsettling read, especially in a day and age where wags and politicos on both sides compulsively accuse one another of plotting to destroy America. Other such books, most recently Philip Roth's The Plot Against America, ask whether a fascist dictatorship can happen here. But whereas Roth manipulates history in order to show what could have happened, imagining an America so blinded by celebrity adulation that it elects an isolationist, anti-Semitic Charles Lindbergh president, Lewis suggests that it already has happened, in little pockets all over America: in bridge club meetings, Rotary luncheons. No invading army will be needed to turn America fascist. Instead, the catalyst will come from within, and when it does it will speak colloquial American, and it will come waving the Stars and Stripes.

. . .

However broad its themes, It Can't Happen Here echoes its time, sometimes literally. The Depression was dragging on, the New Deal was on the rocks, FDR was vulnerable, and the GOP had foundered. People were desperate for strong leadership, and as a result there was a real threat coming from numerous quasi-populist movements led by fire-breathing demagogues promising deliverance.

Among these groups was the Share Our Wealth movement, spearheaded by Senator Huey Long, a former Louisiana governor best known as the inspiration for Willie Stark in Robert Penn Warren's All the King's Men.

Long sought to radically redistribute the nation's wealth and impose an income gap, which, while socialist on its face, was more a cynical ploy for votes than a fast-held ideology. Equally prominent was sulfurous radio personality Father Charles Coughlin's Union of Social Justice, a nativist movement that proposed abolishing the Federal Reserve to reverse the Depression. Both groups were as corrupt as they were illogical, and FDR feared they would combine, unseat him, and replace American democracy with a strain of Hitlerism suited to America's unique temperament.

Driven by his support of Roosevelt and informed by the insights of his second wife, Dorothy Thompson, a pioneering journalist who more than anyone helped bring home the full horrors of Hitler's rise, Lewis cranked out the book in two months in 1935, in the hope that it would help avert what he felt was a looming catastrophe. In order to do so effectively, though, he would have to mine the collective prejudices and disenchantments inherent in the American character.

Enter Berzelius "Buzz" Windrip, Lewis's tyrant. He's a regular guy, personable, plainspoken, "with something of the earthy American sense of humor of a Mark Twain...a Will Rogers." Guided by his secretary Lee Sarason, he cozies up to the electorate by stoking their disdain for fancy ideas and encouraging them to follow their hearts, not their minds.

Windrip's economic policies are disastrous, his figures often incorrect, and his platform seems to change depending on who he's talking to, but none of that matters as long as he keeps expressing himself decisively. "I want to stand up on my hind legs," he writes in Zero Hour, his widely read pre-campaign book, "and not just admit but frankly holler right out that...we've got to change our system a lot, maybe even change the whole Constitution (but change it legally, not by violence)....The Executive has got to have a freer hand and be able to move quick in an emergency, and not be tied down by dumb shyster lawyer congressmen taking months to shoot off their mouths in debates."

When Windrip is elected, all hell breaks loose. Dissent is crushed, the Bill of Rights is gutted, war is declared (on Mexico), and labor camps are established to help shore up Windrip's vaunted "New Freedom," which is more like a freedom from freedom. All that's really left of the old America are the flags and patriotic ditties, which for many is more than enough. But to Lewis it's not entirely the fault of those who will gladly abide America's principles being gutted. The blame also falls on the "it can't happen here" crowd, those yet to realize that being American doesn't change your human nature; whatever it is that attracts people to tyranny is in Americans like it's in anyone else.

When Lewis embarked on It Can't Happen Here, his wife wondered if a dictatorship could happen in this country, whether complacent Babbitt, as she put it, could be taught to march "quickly enough." It was a question that Lewis had already answered. There's a scene in Babbitt where the title character blows up at his wife and admits for the first time in years that he's not as thrilled with his lot as he lets on. His wife soothes him and sends him off to bed, where, "For many minutes, for many hours, for a bleak eternity, he lay awake, shivering, reduced to primitive terror, comprehending that he had won freedom, and wondering what he could do with anything so unknown and so embarrassing as freedom."

In other words, the marching is just pageantry. Windrip's most formidable task, convincing Americans to renounce bedrock democratic principles, was already accomplished well before he took power. It was just waiting for its moment.

Joe Keohane is the editor of Boston's Weekly Dig.

Posted by bhola at 09:35 AM | Comments (0)

December 15, 2005

Students topple second Dow executive?

Thursday, December 15, 2005

BY MARY MORGAN
Business Editor

A mere twelve days after a surprise visit by the activist group Students for Bhopal caused Dow Chairman William Stavropoulos “great consternation,” he has decided to step down.

In a press release dated December 13, 2005, The Dow Chemical Company (NYSE: DOW) announced that William S. Stavropoulos will retire as chairman of the board, effective April 1, 2006. Dow's Board of Directors has elected Andrew N. Liveris, president and chief executive officer (CEO), to succeed Stavropoulos as chairman upon his retirement. Liveris will retain his role as president and CEO.

Dissatisfied with the cleanup of a chemical disaster in Bhopal, India that occurred 21 years ago, several members of “Students for Bhopal,” an activist group, confronted Stavropoulos outside his Midland, Michigan, home on December 1st.

Dow spokesman Scot Wheeler said the small group arrived at the Stavropoulos home, posted a sign, took a photograph, then left. The students were at the home for about 10 minutes.

"The victims of Bhopal have been waiting for two decades," said Ryan Bodanyi, the Coordinator of Students for Bhopal. "The fact that Dow-Carbide has not acted to stop the ongoing contamination of tens of thousands - for which it is responsible - is inhumane, unjust, and immoral."

The gas disaster at the Union Carbide India Limited plant on Dec. 2 and 3, 1984, occurred when methyl isocyanate poured out of a tank and spread into the nearby area by wind, killing 4,000 people and affecting 400,000 others, by some estimates. Dow says the disaster was legally resolved by Union Carbide in a $470 million settlement that was placed in a trust fund for the Bhopal victims.

"We certainly don't think that anybody should forget the tragedy," Dow spokesman Scot Wheeler said. "But legally the matter was settled ... absolutely."

Wheeler added that the protestors' actions were "pushing the limits" and were obviously intended to intimidate Stavropoulos. “It certainly caused him great consternation,” he said. “He was frightened – that’s why he called the police.”

Midland Police Capt. Bob Lane said officers conducted a traffic stop on the vehicles the students were in after they left the home. There were no arrests, and no one was ticketed.

Wheeler denied the protest had hastened Stavropoulos’ retirement. “These plans were made a long time ago,” he said. “The timing of the announcement was a coincidence.”

Bodanyi disagreed. “Stavropoulos was scared, yes,” he said. “Scared of his conscience. We only wanted to talk.”

He claimed Stavropoulos grew frightened, then urinated. “Maybe he was ashamed,” Bodanyi said. “He is getting old,” he added.

Students for Bhopal first confronted Dow executives in 2002, appearing outside the home of Dow CEO Michael Parker on the disaster’s anniversary, December 3rd. Nine days later, Parker was sacked and William Stavropoulos, then company chairman, replaced him.

Dow cited “disappointing financial performance,” adding that "no concern of impropriety" was reflected in the board's decision.

However Bodanyi claimed credit for Parker’s dismissal. “He was having a party on the anniversary of a chemical holocaust,” he said. “Because we caught him he was fired.” Video footage of the incident was later posted on the Greenpeace website.

Dow Spokesman Scot Wheeler did not dispute the video’s contents, but said it played no role in the company’s decision.

"The board reached its decision solely in light of the disappointing financial performance of the company under Mr. Parker’s tenure,” he said, adding that, “Dow is now the leader in its industry. Our revenues last year exceeded $40 billion, and our profits last quarter were up 30%.”

Dow Chemical shares were little changed yesterday, trading down 7 cents to close at $45.03 on the New York Stock Exchange. The 52-week high for Dow shares is $56.75.

Posted by Shevardnadze at 07:37 AM | Comments (0)

December 12, 2005

Bhopal issue takes centre stage in corporate accountability debate: Dow Chemical being damaged by shirked responsibilities

NIKO KYRIAKOU/ONEWORLD.NET

December 12, 2005


SAN FRANCISCO - The global struggle to force Union Carbide and its current owner, Dow Chemical, to take responsibility for a deadly gas leak that occurred in India 21 years ago has gradually gained steam and is now a centerpiece in the growing movement to hold corporations accountable for the negative aspects of their business practices.

December 2 marked the 21st anniversary of the methyl isocyanate gas leak from a Union Carbide pesticide plant in the city of Bhopal that killed some 15,000 people and left another 800,000 suffering from the after-effects of inhaling toxic fumes, according to figures from the Indian government.

The Bhopal issue, which has bubbled up to embroil not just victims of the industrial disaster, but coalitions of company shareholders, global activist networks, the U.S. Supreme Court, and even the White House, has largely centered on Dow's liability for compensating victims and for cleaning up the still-toxic site.

Union Carbide Corporation (UCC) paid a $470-million settlement to victims in 1989, five years after the 40-ton gas leak, but victims' advocates say this was far too little. Dow Chemical, which took over UCC in 2001, says it is not responsible for further compensating victims or for cleaning up any toxins still draining into the soil.

Many children of Bhopal residents were underdeveloped, with smaller heads, shorter limbs, and thinner bodies than normal, says Satinath Sarangi, an activist who runs a clinic to treat the gas victims. Even newcomers who were not exposed to the original gas leak have reported suffering from back pains and sterility, according to Amnesty International.

"The toxic effect has been such that mercury and lead contamination have found their way into the breast milk of those living in the gas-hit localities near the Carbide plant," said Sarangi.

Students in Michigan, where Dow is headquartered, and hundreds of citizens and victims in New Delhi, India, gathered on the anniversary of the disaster to demand that former Union Carbide CEO Warren Anderson and Dow face trial.

The Indian government has charged Anderson and Union Carbide with manslaughter for killing 15,000 people, and claimed damages for injuries to 100,000 more.

The U.S. State Department denied India's request to extradite Anderson after the U.S. Department of Commerce pleaded on the former CEO's behalf, according to documents released in 2004 as the result of a freedom of information act request.

The demonstrators in New Delhi, who were organized by the international environmental group Greenpeace, also demanded that Dow pay additional money for victims' ongoing medical treatment, compensation, economic rehabilitation, and clean up of the still-poisonous site.

Around 20,000 people living near the broken-down Union Carbide plant are drinking contaminated water, according to Amnesty and local activists.

UCC has blamed the tragedy on Union Carbide India Ltd. (UCIL), claiming it had no control over its Indian subsidiary. Amnesty International, however, says that UCC owned 50.9% of UCIL and maintained enough control to prevent the disaster.

In November, these continuing disagreements led a coalition of shareholders owning more than 4.5 million Dow Chemical shares worth some $200 million to file a resolution asking Dow to disclose the financial impact of the Bhopal survivors' outstanding social and environmental concerns. The company refused.

Dow wrote that, "we continue to believe the Company's disclosures of these matters are appropriate and in full compliance with the Generally Accepted Accounting Principles and other requirements of the Securities and Exchange Commission."

The shareholders, which include the New York State Common Retirement Fund, the New York City Fire Department Pension Fund, Sisters of Mercy Regional Community of Detroit Charitable Trust, and Boston Common Asset Management, say that failure to disclose the requested information poses a threat to the company's reputation and market growth in Asia.

"Dow Chemical, with its 2001 acquisition of Union Carbide, has inherited a serious environmental issue. Management really needs to prepare for the potential liability it faces, particularly lost business opportunities around the world, if these issues regarding the Bhopal incident are not resolved," said New York State Comptroller Alan G. Hevesi.

In a related case the Supreme Court ruled in April that citizens damaged by pesticides have the right to sue companies the manufacture these toxic products.

Dow--a key stakeholder in the case--had argued along with the Bush administration that the Environmental Protection Agency's registration on products should shield chemical manufacturers from litigation.

A Texas fisherwoman has taken the company head-on over another high profile scandal.

Diane Wilson, a mother of five and fisherwoman off the coast of Seadrift, Texas, launched a one-women war against Dow when she found out the company was dumping lethal pollutants into Seadrift's bay, killing shrimp and allegedly causing cancer in local residents, including some of her friends.

Wilson forged an alliance with the survivors in Bhopal and was arrested and convicted of a minor misdemeanor after hanging a banner declaring "Dow Responsible for Bhopal" and chaining herself to a tower in her local Dow factory.

Wilson was also fined $2,000 and sentenced to four months in prison.

Refusing to serve her sentence until former UCC CEO Warren Anderson faced the charges against him in India, Wilson left Texas in search of Anderson. She found him at his home in the town of South Hampton on Long Island in New York and stood outside with a sign that said "Warren, shouldn't you be in India?"

"This company has warrants out for their arrest, and they can be defiant and not show up, but let a little woman with a banner drop it...and I'm a dangerous woman--and I have to be thrown in jail," Wilson said.

Bhopal has come to be a prime example cited by advocates for more responsible business practices, and some corporate watch groups say the case is the result of some of the more negative aspects of globalization.

"The problem with globalization is that industry can take advantage of lax environmental standards and get away with it--like Texaco in Ecuador or Shell in Nigeria," Pratap Chatterjee, executive director of the non-profit group CorpWatch in Oakland, California, told OneWorld.

"There isn't a legal regime to enforce regulation and make people accountable, so the United States will not force American executives to comply with Indian laws in the case of Bhopal," said Chatterjee, whose brother gave medical aid to victims in Bhopal days after the gas leak.

Amnesty International agrees that more laws are needed to enforce corporate responsibility, but says that the United Nations has taken positive steps.

"There is a real need for global human rights standards for corporations," said Benedict Southworth, campaigns director at Amnesty International, in a statement on the organization's Web site.

"The U.N. Norms for Business are an important step in this direction, but to hold companies accountable and prevent disasters like Bhopal happening again, it is imperative to have enforceable standards that guarantee redress for victims," Southworth said.

Many of those advocating stiffer legal controls on big business see the Bhopal disaster as just one of many examples of corporate negligence.

"Bhopal was a more dramatic example but this sort of thing happens every day all round the world--a lot of them are unseen disasters, even right here in the Bay Area people are poisoned by industries. It's a slow death--heart problems, respiratory problems, and cancer. You don't see people die overnight but the toxic effects of major industry are felt worldwide," Chatterjee said.

A study released last week in Fortune Magazine found that U.S. companies scored far lower than their European and Asian counterparts on a new corporate accountability rating of Fortune Global 100 companies.

Studies by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control have also found that over 75% of people tested carry breakdown products of chlorpyrifos, a highly toxic pesticide. Dow produces about 80 percent of all chlorpyrifos worldwide, according to the Pesticide Action Network of North America.

Posted by bhola at 09:47 PM | Comments (0)

December 10, 2005

Rancid Requiem: a grandiose memorial scheme irks Bhopal gas victims

K.S. SHAINI WRITING IN OUTLOOK INDIA

Even before it could take off, the Madhya Pradesh government's plans to build a memorial for victims of the 1984 Bhopal gas tragedy is in the thick of controversy.

The government proposes to spend close to Rs 100 crore on building a memorial park at the 67-acre site where the now-defunct Union Carbide plant stands. Survivor groups describe the idea as 'vulgar' and 'unacceptable', and say the money should be spent on giving a better deal to thousands of suffering gas victims.

What put them off, for a start, was the money spent on a national-level competition organised in September by a state government outfit, the Environmental Planning and Coordination Organisation (EPCO), to choose a design for the memorial. Prizes worth Rs 13 lakh were handed out to the architects who entered. The state government now plans to execute the design by Delhi-based architect Suditya Sinha, who was awarded the first prize. Estimated cost: Rs 96 crore.

Some of the striking features of the design, as described by the architect, are:

* An underground tunnel that will have displays on the tragedy, and will end at 'ground zero'— i.e, below the methyl isocyanate plant of the factory—where "it all started or for that matter ended".
* Encasing of the Union Carbide plant in glass, with human dummies operating it, to recall that cold December night, 21 years ago.
* An 'ecological park' spread over several acres with a web of pathways, theme walks and cycling routes.
* Community facilities such as a school and playing fields for the benefit of the "immediate community that suffered the most in the aftermath of the tragedy".
* Landscaping of the whole area with plant species used in 'phytoremediation'—a mechanism by which living plants alter the chemical composition of the soil in which they are growing.

The gas NGOs are not impressed. In fact, they are aghast that the government is planning to launch the project without first cleaning up 200 metric tonnes of toxic waste still left at the site. Studies conducted by environmental watchdog Greenpeace as well as the state government's public health engineering department suggest that the seepage of this waste into the earth over the last 21 years has contaminated ground water sources in a five square kilometre radius around the dump site, affecting 18,000 families living in 25 slum settlements.

"The government has no moral right to construct a memorial when it is not able to meet the medical and other needs of the gas victims," says Satinath Sarangi of the Bhopal Group for Information and Action, an NGO working among gas victims. Other activists, while not disputing the need for a memorial, feel it should be on a much more modest scale than being contemplated, and demand that the gas victims should have a say in what it should be. A committee that included representatives of the survivor groups was in fact constituted to decide on the shape the memorial should take, but was not consulted.

The state government, which has asked the Centre to foot 75 per cent of the cost of construction, seems unfazed. "We will go ahead even if the central government does not chip in," EPCO director-general Satya Prakash, who is also principal secretary, housing and environment, told Outlook. "This was a popular demand and we are going to fulfil it. We want to commemorate the disaster and its victims, just as has been done at Hiroshima and Nagasaki," he says.

An activist sardonically says the proposed memorial would be more of a photographer's delight. "I feel that, at best, its magnificence will provide an excellent contrast with the misery of the people living around it," he adds.

Posted by bhola at 11:40 AM | Comments (0)

December 09, 2005

Dow named among the "Most Wanted Corporate Human Rights Violators of 2005"

Global Exchange today released its list of "Most Wanted Corporate Human Rights Violators of 2005" in honor of International Human Rights Day.

Click here to download a high res PDF of this poster for printing (6 megs)

Below is the Dow Chemical profile featured on GX's Most Wanted Corporate Human Rights Violators. For a complete list go to http://www.globalexchange.org/

DOW CHEMICAL

CEO: Andrew N. Liveris
Contact the Corporation: Dow Chemical Co.
2030 Dow Center
Midland, MI 48674

Human rights abuses: creation of chemical weapons, marketing poisonous chemicals, illegal dumping of toxins into populated areas, environmental destruction, health problems, death

Dow Chemical has been destroying lives and poisoning the planet for decades. The company is best known for the ravages and health disaster for millions of Vietnamese and U.S. Veterans caused by its lethal Vietnam War defoliant, Agent Orange. Dow's "invent first, ask questions later" standard of business led the multinational company to develop and perfect Napalm, a brutal chemical weapon that burned many innocents to death in Vietnam and other wars. In 1988, Dow provided pesticides to Saddam Hussein despite warnings that they could be used to produce chemical weapons.

In 2001, Dow inherited the toxic legacy of the worst peacetime chemical disaster in history when it acquired Union Carbide Corporation (UCC) and its outstanding liabilities in Bhopal, India. As the Students for Bhopal website recounts, "On December 3rd, 1984, thousands of people in Bhopal, India were gassed to death after a catastrophic chemical leak at a UCC 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."

Dow refuses to address its liabilities in Bhopal or even admit its existence, continuing in Union Carbide's tradition of profiting from extreme corporate irresponsibility. In India, Dow's subsidiary faces manslaughter charges and is considered a fugitive from justice for a pending criminal case related to the 1984 chemical explosion. Dow and UCC's lack of accountability in the disaster continue to affect the lives in Bhopal to this day.

World wide, Dow is involved in human rights abuses: environmental destruction, water and ground contamination, health violations, chemical poisoning, and chemical warfare. Dow Chemical's impact is felt globally from their Midland, Michigan headquarters to Plymouth New Zealand. In Midland, Dow has been producing chlorinated chemicals and burning and burying its waste including chemicals that make up Agent Orange. In Plymouth, New Zealand, 500,000 gallons of Agent Orange were produced and thousands of tons of dioxin-laced waste was dumped in agricultural fields. Dow's toxic legacies of human rights abuses traverse to agricultural fields in Central America where Dow exported EPA-banned pesticide DBCP for use on banana and pineapple crops. As a result, thousands of banana workers were exposed to DBCP and became sterile. In retail markets across the world Dow's dangerous chemicals are present as common household solvents, plastics, paints and pharmaceuticals.

Who's working on it:
- Dow Accountability Network
- Vietnam Relief and Responsibility Campaign
- Fund for Reconciliation and Development
- The Vietnam Dioxin Collective
- International Campaign for Justice In Bhopal
- Students For Bhopal • Amnesty International-USA
- Greenpeace International
- Ecology Center
- Tittabawassee River Watch
- Beyond Pesticides

Posted by bhola at 09:03 PM | Comments (0)

December 06, 2005

Diane Wilson ‘Manhunt’ for Anderson Ends With Diane in Jail

On Monday, December 5, Diane Wilson was arrested at a fundraiser attended by Vice President Dick Cheney for embattled U.S. Representative Tom DeLay, the former Majority Leader of the US House before he was indicted on charges of conspiracy and money laundering. Wilson, a leading activist with the progressive women's group Code Pink (and longtime supporter of the Bhopal campaign), briefly disrupted Cheney's speech by unfurling a banner that read "Corrupt greed kills from Bhopal to Baghdad." She was promptly arrested, and remains in police custody.

For $4,200, donors attended a VIP reception, took photographs with Cheney and received recognition at the event. For $2,100, attendees rubbed elbows and took photos with DeLay. Regular tickets, just to have a seat at the table, cost $500 per person, but Diane paid only $50.

"I guess they needed people inside," she said. "You can get in pretty cheap. I didn't want to give too much."

Earlier this year Diane jumped bail and went on the lam to protest the continuing freedom of Warren Anderson, former Chairman of Union Carbide, wanted on charges of “culpable homicide” in India for his role in the deaths of 20,000 Bhopalis. Diane herself was charged with criminal trespass for hanging a banner at a Dow Chemical/Union Carbide facility that said "Dow - Responsible for Bhopal". She received a six month jail sentence for that, which she is due to serve.

Anderson has been wanted by the Indian criminal courts since 1991. In November, Diane began her ‘manhunt’ for Anderson, visiting his summer house in the exclusive beach resort of the Hamptons so she could "try to talk some sense into him." He wasn’t home, but you can listen to this online interview with Diane as she recounts the trip.

On December 3rd, the 21st anniversary of the Bhopal disaster, Diane visited Anderson’s winter estate in Vero Beach, Florida. This is her account of the trip (some names have been changed to protect the innocent):

Sheila and I were in Vero Beach for two days checking out Warren's place on Catalina Court. We tested the electric gate and squeezed between the fences, just barely. i had to almost remove the mirror on the side of the car to squeeze in but we managed. Sheila had a video camera and I drove and she videoed. warren's place was on an end street and we causually checked it out for two days. very little life going on in the whole gated community. not once did we see anybody outside, anywhere. At warren's house it was nicely mowed and the blinds were down and so was the garage door. so we weren’t sure at all that he was there and figured he wasn’t stupid, an absonder from justice, but not stupid. what UCC man would be home on the annniverary of bhopal? none I figured but since i was leaving no stone unturned, we just went right ahead with our plan. The last day, we got some poster board and made several signs in bright yellow so they would stand out. then we bought some stakes at a dept. store and some liquid nail to glue the stuff and had two posters ready. one said: Warren Anderson....Wanted for homicide.....in India the other poster had his arrest warrant and the public notice for his arrest in the Washington Post.

We picked up Vanity Fair writer who is very interested in story at her hotel and then we set out for warren's place again. again we squeezed thru but had a difference or two. when we pulled to the end of the street and i prepared to go up and knock on the door, a man pulled up in a car and was watching us. either he was checking things across the street from warren or he was watching us. We think he was watching us, then lo and behold here comes a white stationwagon of sorts and an elderly woman drove up. she looked at us briefly without smiling then drove up in the driveway like she was goiing to stop. so i got out to talk with her. if she was ms. warren anderson she sure had changed a bunch. we believed she was the house keeper but are not entirely sure. the woman opened the garage door with a little electric thing and she couldn’t work it well so it kept open and closing and opening and closing and i thought everytime it opened that she was going to talk with me, then before it closed entirely, she ran into some chairs in the garage. Well, she obviously wasn't going to talk with me there so i went to the front door and rang the bell about 5 times. finally i figured this lady wasn’t coming out and was probably watching me behind the blinds. so i left a copy of the arrest warrant and highlighted in red, and a note to warren. Again. i left him my address and my cell phone. i told him we definitely had to talk. he and i had something in common....mostly our jail sentences! i thought union carbide and dow had been feeding him some bad advice and he would feel much better about himself if he just turned himself in. Then i could turn myself into to the Texas cops and i told him i bet i'd get a worse time of it. anyhow, we left after i left all that at his door and then i pushed those two stakes into his front yard. We then hightailed it out of there. figured somebody called the law. ahah. anyhow, in love and solidarity!! diane

Posted by Shevardnadze at 09:44 PM | Comments (0)

December 03, 2005

Bhopal commemorates 21st anniversary: story in pictures

DECEMBER 2, TORCHLIGHT PROCESSION AND VIGIL

Children damaged by contamination of their drinking water carry placards bearing their names and the problems from which they suffer. The birth rate for congenital malformations is running at 4 times the national average in localities whose water is contamined.

DECEMBER 3, MARCH THROUGH THE CITY & BURNING OF EFFIGY

The now traditional juloos through the city brings traffic to a standstill and ends up in Kali Parade, outside the derelict Carbide factory, where the many-headed effigy, representing Union Carbide and Dow executives and the US and Indian governments, is set alight.

Posted by bhola at 04:29 PM | Comments (0)

Groups across Asia call for a halt to mass pesticide poisonings

Groups Across Asia Commemorate No Pesticide Use Day - Calls ring out against proliferation of pesticides and corporate control of agriculture

No Pesticides Use Day, held on December 3rd, was inaugurated to draw attention to the life threatening impacts of chemical pesticides on people and the environment.

"It is truly an indictment of our times that millions of workers and farmers across Asia continue to be poisoned, suffer devastating health problems and die from pesticides exposure!", asserts PAN AP Executive Director, Sarojeni V. Rengam. "Many Asian countries are on a hyperdrive to corporatise their agriculture, meaning large-scale monocultures for exports, which are dependent on inputs of agrochemicals," she explains.

"This has led to an intensification in the promotion, sales and use of pesticides. It is an unmitigated tragedy that paraquat, endosulfan and numerous other pesticides—which are extremely hazardous under conditions of use in the South—are still so widely used from Bangladesh to India, from to Thailand to the Philippines, and Cambodia to China", adds Sarojeni.

This year PAN AP has facilitated partners in the region to hold events on December 3, and in the month of December, to raise their concerns on pesticides. The availability of highly toxic pesticides, lack of information and knowledge of their hazards, aggressive marketing by industry as well as poverty, illiteracy, and lack of health facilities in the rural areas ensure that pesticides are a major cause of poisoning in farming communities. Pesticides also poison the air, water, land and food that sustain life.

As noted by the RESIST (Resistance and Solidarity Against Agrochem TNCs) Coalition in the Philippines, "The introduction of pesticides has even altered our ecosystem dramatically. Over 500 species of insects and mites are reported resistant to one or more insecticides while 216 weed species are resistant to at least one class of chemical weed killers". RESIST is launching a project entitled "Forum and Photo Exhibit - The Danger of Pesticides: Pushing for Peasants’ Alternatives" from December 1 to 10, 2005. The Forum and Photo Exhibition will be held in different peasant communities in Bulacan, Nueva Ecija, Laguna and Rizal; and in selected universities and colleges in Manila and Quezon City. Meanwhile, the Pesticide Action Network (PAN) Philippines will be collaborating with groups in Digos, on the island of Mindanao to hold a host of events, the highlight of which will be a motorcade. PAN Philippines will also distribute coconut shell items carrying "No Pesticides" slogans made by the survivors from Kamukhaan, a village situated beside a banana plantation that has been devastated by the pesticides it uses.1

Groups who have been active in the campaign to rid the world of persistent organic polluting (POPs) pesticides are be utilising ‘NO Pesticides Use Day’ to highlight their campaigns. THANAL Conservation Action and Information Network of Kerala, India has been strongly campaigning in support of communities in Kasargod, where over 20 years of aerial spraying of endosulfan has lead to horrific human health and environmental problems.2 THANAL will be highlighting the plight of Kasargod survivors; as well as communities in Eloor—which hosts DDT and endosulfan plants and other chemical factories—who are living with the burden of these industries. An exhibition on Bhopal and Eloor and cultural activities are planned, as well as public meetings and seminars involving tribal communities, estate workers, and students. Meanwhile, Gita Pertiwi, based in Central Java have started monitoring the use of banned pesticides as part of the International Pops Elimination Project, and will hold a regional workshop with farmers, and a Hearing with the Local Legislature in Wonogiri.

Pesticide Eco-Alternatives Center (PEAC), based in Kunming, China, will undertake a seminar and training on paraquat—to assess the risks from paraquat, why it has been banned in various countries, and its use in China. PEAC aims to call for more groups to participate in actions for pesticide use reduction, community empowerment, consumer advocacy, alternatives development and policy recommendations. Meanwhile across in Sri Lanka, the Vikalpani National Women’s Federation will commemorate the ‘No Pesticide Use Day’ by focussing on their campaign on paraquat. Local language posters and booklets have been printed and widely distribute throughout Sri Lanka. They are also planning an awareness-raising seminar involving 500 people, and press conferences. Malaysia based, Tenaganita (Women's Force) will be raising concerns over paraquat during the event by the Coalition of Agriworkers International (CAWI), during the PAN AP organised 'Peoples Camp' which is part of the NGO events in Hong Kong in response to the WTO Ministerial.

The Institute for Sustainable Agriculture Communities (ISAC) will hold a seminar on pesticides on December 24, involving a cross sector of groups and communities in Northern Thailand. And ‘No Pesticide Use Day’ in Cambodia will be held in Prey Veng Province (East of Cambodia). This event, organised by CEDAC (Centre D'Etude Et De Developpement Agricole Cambodgien) will link with the third General Assembly of Farmer and Nature Net (Cambodian Farmers Association), and involve over 800 farmers, government and local authority representatives, NGOs, and University representatives.

The international Pesticide Action Network launched December 3 as the global "No Pesticides Use Day" in 1998, in commemoration of the world’s worst chemical disaster in 1984. Between December 2-3, 1984, twenty-seven tons of lethal gases leaked from Union Carbide’s pesticide factory. The leak immediately killed 8,000 people and injured more than 500,000. Tens of thousands have died from the toxic exposure in the years since, and the death toll continues to rise as a result of long-term effects.

"The tragedy may have occurred in 1984, but the people continue to suffer to this day. PAN AP and our partners around the world demand that both Union Carbide and its new owner Dow Chemical live up to their responsibilities, and stop evading their pending liabilities",3 states Sarojeni. "But we need to remember that hundreds of millions of people, especially farmers and agricultural workers, are exposed to pesticides and suffer acute and chronic effects every year. The poisoning of our bodies, our wombs, our children and the pollution of our water, air, soil and our food by pesticides is totally unacceptable. With the information and documentation that we now have on pesticide hazards, and the successful pesticide reduction and elimination programmes through community IPM and sustainable agriculture initiatives, it is unconscionable that we continue to use pesticides", concludes Sarojeni.

For more information contact:
Sarojeni V. Rengam, Executive Director, Pesticide Action Network (PAN) Asia and the Pacific, Penang, Malaysia. Handphone: +60 16 478 9545 PAN AP Tel: +604 657 0271/ +604 656 0381 Email: panap@panap.net, sarojeni.rengam@panap.net

Jennifer Mourin, No pesticides Use Day Coordinator, Pesticide Action Network (PAN) Asia and the Pacific, Penang, Malaysia. Tel: +604 657 0271/ +604 656 0381 Email: panap@panap.net

Notes:
1. For more information on the situation in Kamukhaan, see:
http://www.panap.net/highlightsA1.cfm?id=31&hiliteid=HILITE13
http://www.panap.net/docs/campaign/Kemukhaan.pdf

2. For more information on the situation in Kasargod, see:
http://www.panap.net/docs/campaign/endoslfn.pdf
http: www.downtoearth.org.in/section.asp?sec_id=7&foldername=20040415

3. In 2001 Union Carbide became a wholly-owned subsidiary of The Dow Chemical Company. Dow, according to its own public statements, made the decision to acquire the company with full knowledge of the criminal charges pending against Carbide and their status as a fugitive from justice. Despite repeated public requests and protests around the world, Dow Chemical has refused to make its new subsidiary appear before the Bhopal District Court to face the criminal charges pending against it. Dow also insists that Union Carbide corrected the situation when they settled the civil damages for $470 million with the Indian government in 1989. However, this settlement did not extinguish the criminal charges against the company or its officials. Moreover, the settlement amount, which was based on inaccurate statistics about the scale and magnitude of the disaster, resulted in each survivor getting only $500 (Rs. 25,000) – barely enough to pay for a few years of medical costs. Source: The International Campaign for Justice in Bhopal, Fact Sheet, available at: http://www.bhopal.net

Posted by Shevardnadze at 04:00 AM | Comments (0)

Doctors at Carbide hospital in Bhopal resign en masse in protest against conditions

BMHRC doctors go on strike, complaining of intransigent and authoritarian management

Resident doctors of the Bhopal Memorial Hospital and Research Centre (BMHRC) -- a super specialty hospital supposedly built in the service of Bhopal Gas Victims -- tendered their resignations and went on strike alleging the management of a dictatorial attitude. The hospital is already under the ambit of the Essential Services Maintenance Act (ESMA).

Besides increases in salary, the Resident Doctors Association demanded the resignations of BMHRC Chairman Justice A M Ahmadi, BMHRC Trustee Aziz Ahmed Siddiqui and BMHRC Director General Indranil Mishra.

The doctors claimed that while Justice Ahmadi was inaccessible to them, the rest of the management ignored staff and were focused on gratifying their personal needs.

The doctors pointed out that earlier 60 doctors were posted at the hospital and alleged that owing to management intransigence, only 37 doctors were posted at the hospital at present.

Mr Siddiqui urged the doctors to return to work. He said that a sub-committee report into the question of salary increases would soon be presented to the management and a final decision taken.

He said salary increases would be paid retrospectively from July 2005.

Claiming that the doctors were being provided adequate facilities, Mr Siddiqui said the strike on the Bhopal Gas Tragedy anniversary smacked of conspiracy.

He commented that the state government could take action against "agitators", as the hospital came under the provisions of the ESMA.

"The question is not only about a hike in salaries. The private patients are treated nicely while gas victims are ill-treated in the hospital. So we resigned collectively," said a junior doctor.

The Bhopal Memorial Trust Hospital has been at the centre of controversy ever since Union Carbide's 50.9% majority shareholding in UCIL, which had been attached by a Bhopal court, was released for sale by the Supreme Court.

Bhopal survivors protested against the ruling, alleging that it would allow Carbide to slip out of India and forget Bhopal. This has indeed proved to be the case. The judgement was vastly beneficial to Union Carbide.

Supreme Court Justice Ahmadi who presided over that decision later became Chief Trustee of the hospital, a move widely seen as inappropriate and raising questions of propriety.

Ahmadi's subsequent dictatorial management style has done nothing to ease concerns.

What is hardly reported in any news story is that the junior doctors' complaints include the way that gas victims, for whose benefit the hospital was supposedly built, are being marginalised and humiliated, their treatment down-graded.

Officials at the hospital have been reported in the past as saying they "cannot wait" for the first eight years to be up, because after this they will be able to concentrate on private patients.

The hospital's super speciality units, indeed seem to have been designed with private patients, for example cardiac cases, in mind, because the heart is one of the few bodily organs that does not seem to have been affected by Union Carbide's gases.

Not a single gas victim sits on the hospital's board of trustees.

Posted by Shevardnadze at 01:37 AM | Comments (0)

December 02, 2005

City of Seattle proclaims December 3rd Bhopal Remembrance Day

Click on the image for the full size proclamation

Posted by bhola at 07:48 AM | Comments (0)

December 01, 2005

Bhopal on My Mind

by Somnath Mukherjee

"Human beings may lie, but the trees that never bore leaves since the night of Dec2nd, 1984 would not", said a 65 year old man in Bhopal, India. He was exposed to the lethal gas leak from the Union Carbide pesticide factory 21 years ago and has not been able to work ever since, because of the resulting breathlessness. Gas spewed out of an underground tank holding 40 tons of lethal methyl isocyanate, as a result of a runaway reaction caused by water leaking into it. The 10 meter high shroud of gas advanced like a stealth killer, in the dead of the night, choking and blinding people in its wake. By the next morning, between 3000 and 8000 were dead, bearing testimony of human vulnerability against a killer of its own making. The old gentleman is one of the 150,000 people who are leading a painful existence as a result of the exposure and are lending their support to a powerful grassroots movement aimed at securing justice for the survivors. What sustains the movement? People.

Not only has the movement continued through the decades, it has gathered strength. Justice has been delayed and denied to the dead and the surviving. The then CEO of Union Carbide continues to ignore the summons of the Indian courts to face criminal charges. The tragedy lives on in Bhopal through the physical suffering of the thousands, congenitally defective children, sterile women, rising incidence to cancer to name a few. Yet the survivors do not perceive anyone being held accountable for the disaster which has been aptly called the Hiroshima of the chemical industry. This outrage in the subaltern consciousness is largely responsible for the resilience of the grassroots campaign.

Inadequate and mismanaged economic compensation has only exacerbated the sense of being wronged. Union Carbide and the government of India settled for a compensation of $470 million 5 years after the tragedy. The monetary cost of a life, a lost livelihood, transgression across generational lines was put at $500 a victim while the cost of cleaning up an otter after the 1989 Exxon Valdez oil spill was $900.

Enormous amount of toxic chemicals and pesticide, lying around unprotected even after 21 years of the disaster, have leached into the groundwater of the neighboring areas. While the powerful actors were busy pointing fingers and reassessing the death toll, the marginalized communities living in the vicinity continued to drink the poisoned water leading to numerous illnesses. A study by Shristi, a Delhi based NGO, published in 2002, found heavy metals, organochlorines and pesticides in the breast milk of nursing mothers. People have felt the sanctity of their bodies being trespassed.

Mainstream history would have probably wrapped up the tragedy in Bhopal as a disaster whose chapter was closed the day of the legal settlement. Seldom has history been affected by the perceptions of the less powerful majority. By collecting evidences and testimonies, the campaign in Bhopal has been preserving history which has been largely ignored by the government, media and the urban elite. Through vigils, marches, petitions and protests the tragedy of December 1984 has been kept alive in the public memory much to the chagrin of the Indian government and Dow Chemical, the present owner of Union Carbide.

Bhopal is relevant today in the developing and the developed world. In the developing world, the rights of the weak and underprivileged are often crushed by corporate interests and the government's eagerness to provide a congenial investment atmosphere. The promised trickle-down benefits are often meager and come with a high social and environmental cost as exemplified by Bhopal. In the developed world, the actual cost of materially comfortable lifestyles remains obscured. Toxic chemicals abound in the things of everyday use, such as non-stick frying pans, pizza boxes, plastic containers, detergents, lubricants etc. A study by Environmental Working Group published in July, 2005 documents the presence of 287 chemicals in the umbilical cord blood of babies born in US hospitals, of which 187 are known carcinogens.

The movement in Bhopal seeks justice, not as mere compensation, but to restore people's faith in the founding virtue of human society.

Posted by Shevardnadze at 03:15 AM | Comments (0)