Depressing tendency to go after soft targets

The media outrage following the mild two-year jail sentences for criminal negligence recently imposed upon the directors of the former Union Carbide (India) Ltd (UCL) who were managing the company in December 1984, when deadly methyl isocynate gas escaped from its Bhopal factory killing 20,000 and wounding and maiming over 550,000 people in one of the worst industrial disasters, is a telling indicator of the proclivity of Indias much-trumpeted free press to go after symbolic and/or soft targets. A quarter century after this catastrophe, the major preoccupation of the media is the whys and wherefores of the safe passage assurance and rapid exit without arrest or trial from India of Warren Anderson, the then US-based chairman of the parent Union Carbide Corporation (UCC), who came visiting in the immediate aftermath of the tragedy.Admittedly as chief executive, Anderson has to bear constructive responsibility. But only a limited symbolic purpose will be served if Anderson and Keshub Mahindra, who was the non-executive chairman of the now defunct Indian company, are made to stand trial on the more serious charge of culpable homicide, instead of criminal negligence under which they were convicted on June 7. More important is to demand accountability from several directly-involved domestic actors of Bhopals man-made disaster who are guilty of aiding and abetting the companys criminal negligence in managing its dangerous business, and compounding the suffering of UCLs victims. This is necessary to ensure that the citizenry is spared future disasters and consequential suffering of the Bhopal gas tragedy proportions. Among the questions that need to be posed and answered are: What is the extent of culpability of the Bhopal municipal government which allowed slum and unauthorised dwellings to spring up around UCLs Bhopal factory which was initially sited beyond civic limits? Why did the Union government which is surely aware of the sloth and inertia of the Indian judicial system make a plea to the US Supreme Court to transfer the civil liability claim for $3.3 billion (Rs.15,510 crore) filed in the US on behalf of the victims, to be transferred to India? Moreover why did the learned justices of the Supreme Court of India approve of and sanctify the paltry settlement amount of $470 million (Rs.2,209 crore) offered by UCC to the Bhopal gas tragedy victims, and wash its hands off its speedy disbursement? And whos to blame that even 26 years after the settlement amount was paid into the Supreme Court, it hasnt yet been fully disbursed to the victims, and that the factory area still hasnt been cleaned up and detoxified, posing danger to air and water of the entire city? Regretably within sentient Indian society as well as in the media, when great calamities occur there is a depressing tendency to vent xenophobic passions and look for the foreign hand — multinationals, Pakistan, China, Washington. Grave dereliction of duty and heinous acts of omission and commission of domestic public officials sworn to provide good governance and protect the public interest, are routinely ignored or…