Govt heaps the Bhopal clean-up mess on NGOs -Governance Now

Govt heaps the Bhopal clean-up mess on NGOs

Salman Khurshid says NGOs prevented clean-up of gas leak site

Ashish Sharma | June 28, 2010

If you are incensed with the government for its failure to clean up the toxic site of the Bhopal gas leak in more than 25 years, think again. Maybe the government's hands were tied. Corporate affairs minister Salman Khurshid suggested as much when he claimed that the government didn't clean up the toxic site of the Union Carbide factory because non-government organisations didn't allow it to do so.

See? While the government has been ready with the mop, the NGOs active in the area have just not been forthcoming with their mandatory nod for the clean-up. But why would the NGOs do so? Isn't the toxic site a persistent hazard and aren't NGOs supposed to be more sensitive about such things than the plain GOs minus the N. The minister had the answer ready while speaking to Indian journalists in London on Sunday.

Khurshid revealed that actually the NGOs had been opposing the government's move to clean up the site because that would involve the use of taxpayers's money for the purpose. The NGOs had been insisting that Dow Chemical, the new owner of Union Carbide, should instead be made to pay for the clean-up, the minister said. Clearly, then, since there was no way the government could make a headway with Dow Chemical, it simply decided to pay heed to the NGOs and omit to clean up the site.

So the NGOs are to blame for the continuing Bhopal tragedy. What's more, the NGOs should be more careful with what they stop the government from doing in future. Maybe we shouldn't blame the government for its abysmal response to the Maoist threat either. After all, haven't the NGOs repeatedly pleaded with the government to stop using force in Maoist-infested areas. Maybe environment minister Jairam Ramesh should fall in line soon as well. Or has he, too, been engaging the NGOs only to blame them later for all his failures?

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