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Lessons not learnt from Bhopal disaster: Experts

By Our Staff Correspondent

BHOPAL, AUG. 8. The distinguished scientist and President of Leadership for Environment and Development (LEAD) India, M.G.K. Menon, today said that it was the responsibility of both the State and the Company to decontaminate the Union Carbide plant, where large quantities of toxic waste continued to lie abandoned even 20 years after the gas disaster.

Professor Menon was speaking at the valedictory session of LEAD India's three-day meeting here. He said that every one focussed attention on the Bhopal gas disaster but there appeared to be very little concern for large number of sites that were highly contaminated by industries -- both multinational and Indian. In fact, he said, we were sitting on ticking time bombs that could lead to enormous consequences.

He said DNA has proved that all living things are one and we are one with nature. The concept of non-violence and harmony was linked with this. This created the fundamental value system that related to social justice and ethics. The area of environment and development should be based on the concept of social justice, he said adding that development should be for successive generations.

The LEAD International Executive Director, Julia Marton Lefevere, informed that she was on the Environmental Advisory Board of Dow Chemicals -- the company that has taken over Union Carbide Corporation. She said "we do not want to get involved in legalities but would not stay behind when it comes to working absolutely on human grounds."

LEAD Pakistan's National Programme Director, Ali Tauqeer Sheikh, said that there should be a Declaration asserting that there should not be a repeat of Bhopal tragedy. He said that it should be a corporate social responsibility "to take one step more than what is legally required". There had to be a demonstration against corruption, he said, adding that corruption was a disease that was all pervasive.

Mr. Sheikh said that LEAD was a very effective network of professionals from different countries committed to development that was environmentally sustainable and socially equitable.

Speaking on the occasion, the founder of Bhopal Group of Information and Action, Satinath Sarangi, said that the number of mental cases among the gas victims was very high but there were very few doctors, to be precise only three of them, to treat them. He said it was unfortunate that lessons had not been learnt from the gas disaster. The corporate sector had only learnt how to do better PR (public relations), he added.

He said that the Company that designed, operated and ran the Bhopal plant and the people who took the decisions were still free and no one had done anything to force other companies to correct their ways.

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