Are corporate interests more important than citizens' welfare for our governments? -Governance Now

Are corporate interests more important than citizens' welfare for our governments?

Ashish Sharma | June 10, 2010

Close on the heels of the tragic Bhopal gas leak verdict has come the revelation that the Centre dropped a key clause in the Nuclear Liability Bill to benefit suppliers who could have been held accountable for wilful negligence. The move reportedly came after American suppliers mounted pressure to get deleted section 17 (b) which said that suppliers could be sued for a nuclear accident resulting from wilful act or gross negligence on their part.

Amidst a raging debate over the woefully inadequate compensation to victims and sentence to perpetrators of the Bhopal tragedy, the Centre's move appears to be yet another case of our governments batting for corporates even at the cost of national interest. The furore over capping the liability at Rs 500 crore clearly did not deter the government from tinkering with the controversial Bill further.

If Prime Minister Manmohan Singh has much to explain about going out of his way to guard interests of American suppliers, so does Delhi Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit about backing the power distribution companies that have been found guilty of fudging information about their financial health. Even as Delhi's power regulator has found that the three power distribution companies clocked a profit of around Rs 1,000 crore last fiscal, the chief minister continues to plead for slapping a hike in tariff on the hapless consumers. Only now she is arguing for an uninterrupted power supply instead of her earlier stance of helping the distribution companies bridge their losses.

The larger question, therefore, arises whether corporate interests are more important than citizens' welfare for our governments.

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