Bhopal gas tragedy: Would pursue curative petition seeking additional funds for victims, Centre tells SC

The Centre would pursue its curative petition seeking Rs 7844 crore as additional funds from successor firms of the USbased Union Carbide Corporation UCC for giving compensation to victims of the 1984 Bhopal gas tragedy the Supreme Court was informed on TuesdayA fivejudge constitution bench headed by Justice S K Kaul took note of the submission made by Attorney General R Venkataramani and directed the Centre to prepare a compilation within eight weeks in this regardThe Attorney General has taken a stand before us that the government would like to press the curative petitionA number of NGOs would like to be impleaded However counsel for respondents has questioned the maintainability of the petitions as they have come 19 years after the judgementThe government would represent plaints of persons who have suffered and thus a compilation would be required to be prepared by the office AG and the resp insofar as the applicants associations are concerned we do not give any liberty to file any pleadings the bench also comprising Justices Sanjiv Khanna A S Oka Vikram Nath and JK Maheshwari saidThe matter will now be taken up for hearing on January 10 2023Also Read Two judges elevated as chief justices of high courtsThe apex court had earlier asked the Centre to clarify its stand on whether it wants to go ahead with its curative petition seeking additional fundsThe UCC now owned by Dow Chemicals gave a compensation of USD 470 million Rs 715 crore at the time of settlement in 1989 after the toxic methyl isocyanate gas leak from the Union Carbide factory on the intervening night of December 2 and 3 1984 killed over 3000 people and affected 102 lakh moreThe apex court is to hear the curative petition filed by the Centre seeking a direction to Union Carbide and other firms for an additional Rs 7844 crore over and above the earlier settlement amount of USD 470 millionThe survivors of the tragedy have been fighting for long for adequate compensation and proper medical treatment for ailments caused by the toxic gas leakThe Centre had filed the curative petition in the apex court in December 2010 for enhanced compensationOn June 7 2010 a Bhopal court had sentenced seven executives of Union Carbide India Limited UCIL to two years imprisonmentThe then UCC chairman Warren Anderson was the prime accused in the case but did not appear for the trialOn February 1 1992 the Bhopal CJM court had declared him as an absconderThe courts in Bhopal had issued nonbailable warrants against Anderson twice in 1992 and 2009 before his death in September 2014This story has been sourced from a third party syndicated feed agencies Midday accepts no responsibility or liability for its dependability trustworthiness reliability and data of the text Midday managementmiddaycom reserves the sole right to alter delete or remove without notice the content in its absolute discretion for any reason whatsoever