BHOPAL: The Search for Justice

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Awarded Best Medium Length Film
International Festival of Environmental Film and Video
Goias, Brazil

On December 2, 1984, the Union Carbide pesticide plant in Bhopal, India leaked poisonous methyl isocyanate gas killing fifteen thousand helpless men, women and children. Hundreds of thousands more were permanently maimed. Bhopal was, and remains, the world’s worst chemical industry disaster.

Twenty years later, survivors and their families are being re-victimized by the deliberate thwarting of scientific and medical studies concerning the disaster. To this day, they have been denied definitive information about the precise composition of the leaked gas and its long-term effects. Each day, children are born with defects that may be related to the gas leak. Beautiful Bhopal, once known as the “City of Mosques” is a sad, disgraceful testament to the absence of environmental and human justice - very much a place where “the world stopped watching”.

"Bhopal: The Search for Justice", straddles the intersection between science, politics and human rights. Exploring charges of corruption, graft and greed, the film follows Raajkumar Keswani, the local journalist whose prediction of the Union Carbide disaster proved prophetic. Set against the rich visual tapestry of India, Keswani travels through the Indian bastiis where the poorest victims live, and to the offices of frustrated doctors and scientists. Finally he makes his first trip to North America in search of answers.

As activists protest and demand justice from DOW Chemical (which now owns Union Carbide), Keswani documents the legacy of the gas leak - the continued pollution of drinking water sources; gas widows trying to survive on inadequate settlements; the possibility that second and third generation children are growing up with genetic abnormalities caused by the gas.

The film explores the haunting human cost of a multinational polluter. Its subjects articulate their desperate need for the truth. Bhopal is a wound that continues to worsen. Beyond the initial horror and devastation of the gas tragedy is the spreading damage of environmental and genetic assault. At stake is more than fair compensation and long-term rehabilitation for the afflicted – “Bhopal” has become a rallying cry for post 9/11 concerns about chemical industry security and industrial pollution. Ultimately, the horrific gas leak at Union Carbide imposed a "chemical trespass" of the human body that demands greater regulation by governments and responsibility from multinational corporations.

Characters

The film’s "cast" is a “Who’s Who” of Bhopal’s tragedy. Noted subjects include:
Canadian scientist,

Dr. Rosalie Bertell, who founded the International Medical Commission on Bhopal.

Brian Mooney, New York University anthropology professor and former lawyer with Kelley, Dyre and Warren, Union Carbide's New York City law firm.

Dr. N.P. Mishra, Chairman of Department of Medicine at Hamidia Hospital and Dean of Medical Faculty, Gandhi Medical College. He attributed cherry red blood not to cyanide by presence of carbon monoxide poisoning.

Daya Varma, retired professor of pharmacology at McGill University in Montreal. Varma has published numerous research articles on the health effects of MIC in Bhopal, including most recently a JAMA research letter indicating a link between MIC exposure and growth retardation in male boys in Bhopal.;

V. Ramana Dhara, M.D. in Atlanta, Georgia - Sc.D of the International Medical Commission on Bhopal whose 2002 review of the health effects of the disaster reports that “In follow up studies, investigators observed persistent irritant effects, including ocular lesions and respiratory impairments. … Significant neurological, reproductive, neurobehavioral, and psychological effects were also observed.”

Dr. Aru Sathpathy, assistant to Dr. Chandra at Gandhi Medical College, shows us samples of the epidemic of ravaged fetuses and spontaneous abortions resulting from the gas leak.

Indira Jaising, New Delhi lawyer and Supreme Court of India advocate for the Union Carbide victims, she headed challenge to Bhopal Act, creation of the Bhopal Hospital Trust with assets liquidation of UCIL assets. About the Bhopal Act, she says: “… this exclusion of the victims was to have fatal consequences for the litigation. It is not without significance that Union Carbide challenged every single move by the GOI in the litigation except this one thing: they did not seriously challenge the power of the government to represent the victims.”

Abdul Jabbar Khan and Sathyu Sarangi. These are the two faces of Bhopal activism: one focused on achieving justice locally and nationally and the other on bringing to book Dow Chemical, the owner of UC, and now a target of a new generation of dissent.

Abdul Khan Khan is Convenor of the Sangathan or Bhopal Gas-Affected Woman Workers’ Organization, which represents thousands of victims of the gas leak. He has been involved in a broad spectrum of activism over many years related to the interests of the survivors. Bhopal

Satinath Sarangi, Director of Sambhavna Trust or Bhopal People’s Health Clinic and Documentation Center and recording secretary of Permanent Peoples’ Tribunal session held in Bhopal in 1991 at which the International Medical Commission on Bhopal was founded and who reported on the Supreme Court of India ban on publication of the ICMR research results. “While Indian doctors have done a great deal of research, they have been prevented from publishing it, initially because of pending court cases. This has made it impossible to chart the effects of the gas, to assess the best forms of treatment, or even to give a reliable figure of those badly affected. The 15 doctors said it was immoral to do research on people and then to withhold results that could benefit them. They urged the Bhopal health authorities to stop building hospitals and to move towards more basic health care.”

Stuart Diamond, former New York Times reporter and Professor of Law at the University of Pennsylvania.

U.S. Senator Jon Corzine, author of chemical industry security legislation.

Dinesh Nema, a Bhopali who was at the epicenter of the catastrophe, burning bodies and burying children at the Chola Crematory for three days and nights;

RELATED LINKS

COUNCIL ON INTERNATIONAL & PUBLIC AFFAIRS (CIPA)
Bhopal 20th Anniversary Library
http://www.cipa-apex.org

INTERNATIONAL CAMPAIGN FOR JUSTICE FOR BHOPAL
Latest news and updates about the international campaign for justice in Bhopal
http://www.bhopal.net

STUDENTS FOR BHOPAL
National network of students dedicated to campaigning for the victims of the Bhopal disaster.
http://www.studentsforbhopal.org

PETITION FOR JUSTICE
Petition to Dow Chemical: even 20 years later, the people of Bhopal, India, continue to suffer and die because of Dow-Carbide’s gas and the poisons it left behind. http://www.petitiononline.com/bhopal/petition.html

THE PESTICIDE ACTION NETWORK
The Pesticide Action Network working to reduce the use of hazardous pesticides.
http://www.panna.org

GREENPEACE
http://www.greenpeace.org