SC rejects Centre’s application for additional compensation of Rs 7844 crore for Bhopal gas tragedy victims.
The Supreme Court has rejected the Centre’s application for additional compensation of Rs 7844 crore to the Bhopal gas tragedy victims. The Supreme Court said that in 1989 there was an agreement on compensation between the government and the company.
In fact, a five-judge constitution bench of the Supreme Court has rejected the Centre’s plea to increase the amount of compensation for the victims of the 1984 Bhopal gas tragedy. The Supreme Court also said that the compensation was sufficient. If the government found more compensation necessary, it should have given it itself.
‘There is no logic in taking up the matter after two decades’
A five-judge constitution bench headed by Justice Sanjay Kishan Kaul said there was no logic in the Center raising the issue even two decades after the matter was settled. The Supreme Court said that the amount of Rs 50 crore lying with the RBI for the victims will be used by the Union of India to settle the pending claims of the victims.
The bench said that we are dissatisfied with the Government of India for not providing any rationale for raising this issue after two decades, we are of the view that curative petitions cannot be entertained, the bench said. The Center had filed a petition in the Supreme Court demanding an additional Rs 7,400 crore from the firms to give more compensation to the victims. The agreement with Abadau Chemicals will not reopen after the Supreme Court’s decision. A bench of Justice Sanjeev Khanna, Justice Abhay S Oka, Justice Vikram Nath and Justice JK Maheshwar had also reserved its decision on the Centre’s petition on January 12.
The Supreme Court said that if we accept the petition, the ‘Pandora’s Box’ will open. The court said that the central government should use Rs 50 crore available with the Reserve Bank of India to compensate the pending claims. The Supreme Court clarified that the agreement can be canceled only on the basis of fraud. No argument was given by the Central Government regarding fraud in the agreement.
A curative petition was filed by the Center seeking additional compensation of Rs 7,400 crore from the successor firms of Union Carbide Corporation (UCC) for the victims of the 1984 Bhopal gas tragedy. At the same time, the Union Carbide Corporation had told the Supreme Court that it would not pay a single penny to the Bhopal gas victims apart from the agreement made in 1989. It is noteworthy that more than 3,000 people were killed and 1.02 lakh were affected in the Bhopal gas tragedy.
The Central Government had filed this petition because it has been fighting for a long time for adequate compensation and proper treatment for the diseases caused by the poisonous gas leak. The Central Government had filed this petition in December 2010. On 7 June 2010, a court in Bhopal sentenced seven officials of UCIL to two years’ imprisonment.
