On February 20, survivors of the 1984 Union Carbide disaster in Bhopal began a 500-mile padyatra (pilgrimage by foot) to assert their “fundamental rights to justice and a life of dignity and health.”
“In amongst the gathering, the feeling is upbeat and playful,” one marcher wrote, “despite the austerities [that] will be faced during the way, which pale compared to the 23 years of suffering since that night in 1984. The oldest padyatri is Gulab Bai, who is 76 years old, and the youngest is 10 years.”
Some 100 marchers were retracing the same arduous route from Bhopal to New Delhi that was taken by survivors in April 2006. When those earlier marchers reached the capital, it took seven days of fasting before India’s Prime Minister, Manmohan Singh, came out to talk with the survivors. Singh promised to do everything in his power to help the Bhopal victims and to punish the corporations responsible for the explosion and for abandoning the victims in the decades since.
But the Prime Minister did little to follow through. Two years later, the site of the plant still hasn’t been cleaned up, 20,000 people still drink contaminated water, and 10–15 people a day continue to die from chemical exposure. Meanwhile, Dow Chemical (the site’s owner since it bought Union Carbide) is attempting to broaden its presence in India, despite the tragic Bhopal legacy.
The marchers are demanding clean drinking water, medical care, economic rehabilitation, and a full environmental cleanup. Other demands include the extradition of former Union Carbide chief Warren Anderson from the U.S. Anderson faces criminal charges in India’s courts. The marchers also want the government to ban four deadly pesticides that were approved after U.S. companies bribed Agriculture Ministry officials. The pesticides include Dursban (Dow’s chlorpyrifos product for the home), which was withdrawn from use in the U.S. in 2001.
People from across India, the U.K., U.S. and other countries have sent thousands of postcards and faxes to Prime Minister Singh, demanding that this year he “walk his talk” and address the needs of the long-suffering Bhopalis.
ON THE WEB
For updates and results of the march, see panna.org/Bhopal2008