India’s first People’s Museum will show the pain of Bhopal gas tragedy victims

BHOPAL: In India’s first People’s Museum being developed in Bhopal a tribute to Bhopal gas tragedy victims. Here the things of the great disaster’s survivor and victims can be seen. Bano Bee’s sari, Sajjad’s sweater and pants, the walking stick of one Hafiza Bee’s husband, an army medal, a bridal dress, a mangal sutra, wooden legs, bangles, milk bottle, spectacles and a pencil box will be kept. These were the survivors and victims of that disaster.

Also the survivors of the gas tragedy will narrate their own story. There would be a headphone and visitors will not only see the objects displayed but also hear the story of a particular victim or survivor.

Well it’s not a government-built effort, but a community-run museum with the concept of “nothing about me, without me.”

Satinath Sarangi of the Bhopal Group for Information and Action said, “The Madhya Pradesh government is also working on a museum on gas tragedy, but neither have survivors been asked nor have they any idea how it is being built. And the biggest thing – the government has no moral right to memorialise because it is complicit in the injustice meted out to the community.”

On the intervening night of Dec 2-3, 1984, tonnes of poisonous methyl isocyanate had leaked from the then Union Carbide factory in Bhopal, killing over 3,000 lives instantly, around 25,000 over the years and affecting around 500,000 people, according to victims.

As the fight for justice presses on after 27 years, objects related to the movement like chains and locks, rakhis, posters and banners will also be exhibited.
Also the travelling museum will be ready by April 2012. The survivors are now developing their own travelling exhibition, which they hope will be a permanent museum in the city later. A trust, Remember Bhopal Trust, has been set up for the museum. The survivors have enlisted Rama Lakshmi, a museologist, who has worked on two such projects in the United States.

“For a good future, the past should be remembered. Unfortunately, we are forgetting the past and the government wants that either we do not remember it or we remember it as they want. But with such a museum, we would be able to preserve our past,” Abdul Jabbar of the Bhopal Gas Peedith Mahila Udyog Sanghathan said.