The Night of Death March.
Today we will discuss with you the biggest chemical accident in the history of the whole world which is called the night of death march. Yes, you have guessed right, we are going to discuss about the gas accident in Bhopal, Madhya Pradesh. Then all the Bhopal residents were fast asleep, unaware of the deadly thing that was about to await them. After a while, they were awakened by a strange smell of burning gas. But their eyes were burning, some were vomiting, some could not stand, fell down again and again, and some were screaming with burning pain. As the night progressed, the number of human deaths increased, not only humans but also all the animal kingdoms were destroyed in an instant.
On the morning of December 3, 1984, everyone knew what had happened. A gas called Methyl Isoside was released all over Bhopal by a private company called Union Carbohydrate India Private Limited. The amount of gas was about 42 tons, so you can imagine what a huge amount of gas was mixed into the air.
In the morning it can be seen that this huge amount of gas is accumulated in the sky of Bhopal almost like a cloud. About 15,000 people die instantly and many die of cancer for the rest of their lives. This company was originally an American company, but various Indian investors had shares here, so it cannot be called a fully American company. Basically, their work was to produce things like pesticides and other gases. As soon as this factory was set up, there was a controversy, with local people arguing that how could such a company be allowed to operate in such a densely populated area, where toxic gases would be produced and would not be visible to the general public, but the Govt. Basically don’t care about all these things.
It was heard the company to have stockpiled about 200 tons of toxic gas like methyl isocyanate, only 25 percent of which mixed with air to cause such a major accident. It was later learned that the accident occurred due to the negligence of the company staff, the water somehow mixed with the methyl isocyanide gas and a chemical reaction took place, resulting in the formation of heavy smoke that spread across the city without smoke. Even the doctors could not understand what exactly was causing this type of event and many people died within the morning. Adjacent to this factory was a slum which was a densely populated area, hence the number of deaths was highest and mainly from this slum a large number of workers were employed in this factory.
After this incident, the United States police arrested the owner of this company, but he was released shortly after. The Indian government sued the company in the US for $3.3 billion in damages, though they later settled for just $470 million. The effect of this gas was so terrible that the present generation who are born in Bhopal are born with cancer or some other physical deformity. Later it was seen that it was all the negligence of the company i.e. there was no safety system if the company had followed proper safety guidelines, then maybe the amount of damage would not have been so much. Despite all the safety recruitment, it was later discovered that they had fallen into disrepair, i.e. they had not been regularly maintained, leading to the death of so many people in 1984. However, the Government of India has become very conscious of its safety guidelines before granting licenses to any chemical company. But we will never get those people back, but if we are careful in the future, we can avoid accidents like Bhopal and we will not have to lose many people.
