Bhopal gas victims demand rehabilitation and medical care

NEW DELHI - About 200 surviving victims of the 1984 Bhopal gas tragedy demonstrated here on Thursday to press for their long pending demands of rehabilitation and medical care.

They said they would protest until the panel promised years ago to look into their demands, is constituted.

Four Bhopal based non-governmental organisations organised the protest on behalf of the victims.

“Our indefinite protest will begin from today. We are fighting to get proposed panel constituted on Bhopal gas tragedy mainly. We have only one demand that the central government constitutes the proposed panel, for the rehabilitation, medical care, employment for the victims of gas tragedy and their children which it promised two years back, “said Satinath Sarangi, Bhopal Group for Information and Action, an NGO fighting for the cause.

In the early hours of December 3, 1984, around 40 metric tonnes of toxic methyl isocyanate (MIC) gas leaked into the atmosphere and was carried by the wind to the surrounding slums.

The government says around 3,500 died as a result of the disaster.

Activists however calculate that 25,000 people died in the immediate aftermath and the years that followed. (ANI)