The judge who delivered the verdict in the Bhopal gas tragedy case took Union Carbide Corporation (UCC) and its Indian subsidiary UCIL to task, terming the 1984 holocaust a “white-collar crime” by an American corporation that “cynically used a third world country to escape the increasingly strict safety standards imposed at home”.

Safety procedures were minimal. Neither the American owners nor the Indian management of UCIL seemed to regard safety measures “as necessary”, chief judicial magistrate Mohan P Tiwari said in the judgment pronounced last Monday convicting business tycoon Keshub Mahindra, among others, for negligent running of the pesticide plant.

Tiwari did not spare then Madhya Pradesh chief minister Arjun Singh, either, saying the administration had no plan to deal with the disaster.

“Prompt action by local authorities could have saved many, if not most, victims. The immediate response was marred by callous indifference,” the 95-page judgment, a copy of which is with ‘DNA’, said.

Tiwari said Union Carbide was not a “human being” that could be sentenced to jail and recommended a special law on the lines of the UK health and safety at place of work legislation to ensure not only workers but those residing in the vicinity of a factory handling hazardous material get protection and rehabilitation.

Stressing the need for sustained and serious prosecution of delinquent companies, the judge said corporate bodies, such as a firm or a company, undertook a series of activities that “affect the life, liberty and property of the citizens”.

“Large-scale financial irregularities are done by corporations. The corporate vehicle now occupies such a large portion of the industrial, commercial and sociological sectors that amenability of the corporation to a criminal law is essential to have a peaceful society with stable economy”.

UCC should have self-realised the need to exercise the “greatest care” when dealing with such lethal chemicals. It was also the burden of the local government to play a supervisory and regulatory role with utmost sincerity. However, both UCIL and government utterly failed to do so, the judge observed.

The tragedy was caused by the “synergy of the very worst of American and Indian cultures”, he said.

Highlighting the gravity of the tragedy caused due to the leakage of lethal MIC and other poisonous gases from the UCC plant in Bhopal, the court said those who ran inhaled the killer gas more than those who had a vehicle to ride. Children and other people of shorter stature inhaled higher concentrations. Many people were trampled trying to escape.

In addition to MIC, Phosgene, a gas used by German ruler Adolf Hitler to kill Nazis during World War-II, leaked from the killer plant.

“How could this gas be handled by untrained or less trained workers,” the court asked.