Bhopal gas killings: CBI for stringent charges against accused
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COMMENTS 
India’s Central Bureau of Investigation has moved the Supreme Court seeking to restore the stringent charge of culpable homicide, which attracts a maximum punishment of 10 years in jail
The Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI), on August 2, 2010, made a delayed but determined attempt not to allow the accused in the Bhopal gas leak case to walk away with a two-year sentence, by filing a curative petition in the Supreme Court seeking to slap stringent charges under Section 304-II of the IPC against them.
The Supreme Court’s September 13, 1996, judgment diluted the charges from Section 304-II, which provides a maximum of 10 years’ imprisonment for the accused to Section 304 A of the IPC, which at best entails a two-year jail term.
Twenty-six years after the tragedy -- the worst ever industrial disaster that claimed the lives of over 10,000 people -- a Bhopal trial court, on June 7 this year, convicted all the accused, including former chairman of Union Carbide India Ltd (UCIL) Keshub Mahindra, and awarded the maximum sentence under Section 304 A, triggering outrage and forcing the government to take corrective measures.
To counter any arguments based on the 14-year delay in filing a curative petition, Attorney General G E Vahanvati has given a carefully worded certificate saying this petition needed to be entertained as it fell in the ‘rarest of rare’ category, where the apex court could correct a judgment that resulted from the misreading of solid evidence presented by the CBI showing culpability of the accused under Section 304-II.
The petition, drafted by advocate Devadatt Kamat, minced no words in describing the illogicality of the 1996 judgment and justified state action, though delayed, in taking corrective steps. “It is an attempt by the government to set right gross miscarriage and perpetuation of irremediable injustice being suffered by the victims in particular, society at large and the nation as a whole,” the CBI said.
It criticised the accused -- Keshub Mahindra, V P Gokhale, Kishore Kamdar, J Mukund, S P Chaudhary, K V Shetty, S I Quereshi and UCIL -- for deliberately ignoring mechanical faults in the pipeline connecting tanks storing methyl isocyanate (MIC) that led to the leak on the night of December 2-3, 1984, resulting in the death and injury of thousands of people.
“The perpetrators behind the leakage of MIC gas from the UCIL plant should not be allowed to walk away with a minimal punishment of two years under Section 304 A, in one of the world’s biggest industrial catastrophes, despite ample evidence to show the commission of an offence under Section 304-II of the IPC,” the CBI said.
Source: The Hindustan Times, August 3, 2010
Press Trust of India, August 3, 2010
The Indian Express, August 3, 2010