Bhopal: One day in November, patients start gathering at 7am outside the Sambhavna Trust Clinic, a small, free clinic in one of the areas worst affected by the Bhopal gas tragedy. After getting their tokens, they sit in the warm winter morning sun to wait their turn.
Shamshen Nisa, a portly, middle-aged woman who is awaiting her turn, has been coming to the clinic for the past 10 years. The exposure to the gas released from the Union Carbide factory, she says, has left her with high blood pressure, a tendency to put on weight and painfully swollen feet.
A few kilometres away at the Chingari Trust, a rehabilitation centre for children of gas victims born with congenital defects, seven-year-old Kushi Verma’s twisted frame lies on her mother’s lap. She was born with cerebral palsy. Herspine is so curved that she can’t even sit straight. Her words are slurred, and she can barely manage a delicate smile.
Nisa, Verma and others like them are at the core of a debate that continues to rage 25 years after the leak of methyl isocyanate from Union Carbide’s factory here. Are these ailments and congenital defects a result of that leak, and the continuing impact of pollutants in and around the factory? No one is sure, and there are no statistics that anyone had bothered to collect.
Also Read our previous stories in this series
And there are two, opposite schools of thought.
None of the studies conducted by the state’s hospitals has “shown a significant incidence of medical problems in the gas affected wards”, says Babulal Gaur, minister for gas relief and rehabilitation, Madhya Pradesh.
He adds that the Union Carbide factory is absolutely safe.
Rachna Dhingra, an activist with the International Campaign for Justice in Bhopal, has problems with both claims. Chemicals dumped on the factory premises, she claims, continue to pollute groundwater in the area. And the exposure to gases from the factory 25 years ago and the continuing pollution have, according to her, left Bhopal with a slew of medical problems.
The schism between activists and the government seems to be widening. The medical and environmental legacies of the disaster remain highly disputed, and none of the dozens of studies done on them has addressed the issue with any degree of finality.
Thus, while Dhingra insists that instances of respiratory diseases, cancer, heart problems and congenital defects can be “found in every second house in some areas”, Nalok Banerjee, officer in charge at the Centre for Rehabilitation Studies of the state government, claims that not a single study done by government hospitals in Bhopal has shown a greater than normal incidence of medical problems in the 36 gas-affected wards.