Home Minister P Chidamabaram said that the Group of Ministers on Bhopal Gas leak disaster will finalise its report on Monday."The GoM will have two sessions on Saturday and Sunday, the Home Minister said.
A 55-page document gathered using the Right To Information Act from the Prime Minister's Office shows how the members of United Progressive Alliance government including some senior ministers have taken a soft stance towards Dow chemicals.
The Group of Ministers on Bhopal gas tragedy is understood to have decided on Sunday to recommend filing of a curative petition in the Supreme Court to fix criminal liability, seek extradition of former Union Carbide Corp CEO Warren Anderson and cleaning up the complex by burying the toxic waste.
Despite a statement issued by Prime Minister Dr Manmohan Singh to hold a meeting of the Group Of Ministers for the Bhopal gas tragedy at the earliest, the GOM headed by Union Home Minister P Chidambaram would meet only on June 18, the date which was originally scheduled for the meeting, as the home minister is learnt to be busy with developments in Manipur.
The Congress Core Committee met on Thursday evening to discuss the Bhopal gas leak and to give directions to the Group of Ministers who would be meeting on Friday afternoon to find a way of breaking the impasse created by the court verdict in handing out punishment to the guilty, said highly placed sources.
The Bharatiya Janata Party has said that it is unhappy with the recommendations suggested by the Group of Ministers on the Bhopal tragedy case.
As the prime minister asked the Group of Ministers on Bhopal tragedy to meet immediately, Health Minister Ghulam Nabi Azad, who is a member of the GoM, said on Monday that the panel can probe under what circumstances the industrial disaster took place and how the punishment for the culprits was reduced.
The Group of Ministers headed by Home Minister P Chidambaram, after three-day long deliberations, submitted its report to Prime Minister Manmohan Singh on Monday. The GoM was constituted by Dr Singh to make recommendations on relief, rehabilitation and remediation issues and legal options in the wake of the recent trial court judgment in the case.Sources in the Congress say that the GoM has given a clean chit to former prime minister Rajiv Gandhi.
In a move meant to score political points and to garner some of the credit for resolving the Bhopal issue, the Congress leadership is learnt to have asked the prime minister to ensure that the compensation given to the victims of the Bhopal Gas tragedy is "adequate".
The reconstituted Group of Ministers on the Bhopal gas tragedy will meet on Friday, Home Minister P Chidambaram said on Tuesday, a day after Prime Minister Manmohan Singh asked the panel to submit its report to the Cabinet in 10 days.
An effigy of Union Home Minister P Chidambaram was set on fire by victims of the Bhopal gas tragedy on Saturday to protest the decision by the Group of Ministers of not revising the figures of deaths and the injured in the curative petition pending before the Supreme Court. The GoM decision would mean the victims would not be able to claim additional compensation, which they have been clamouring for.
The Group of Ministers on Bhopal gas tragedy discussed legal options available to the government, said Home Minister P Chidambaram on Saturday, the second day of the GoM meeting.
The GoM, headed by Home Minister P Chidambaram, that went into a whole range of issues, including relief and rehabilitation of the victims, is believed to have recommended payment of Rs 10 lakh to the next of kin of the dead in the world's worst industrial disaster nearly 26 years ago.
A Group of Ministers on Friday gave its approval to the Madhya Pradesh government to dispose of 350 metric tonnes of Union Carbide toxic waste in Germany.
The Bharatiya Janata Party and the Left Front on Monday slammed the Group of Ministers on the Bhopal gas issue for recommending that the government pick up the tab on payment of compensation to victims."The GoM report has disappointed the people," BJP spokesperson Shahnawaz Hussain said. Communist Party of India - Marxist leader Nilotpal Basu told PTI, "It is unfair that the taxpayer has to pick up the compensation bill."
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