Facing intense public criticism for “mishandling” the Bhopal gas tragedy case, the CBI on Monday finally filed a curative petition in the Supreme Court for restoration of the charge of “culpable homicide not amounting to murder” against the UCIL top brass, who got away with a lighter punishment of two years despite causing the death of over 5,295 innocent people and permanent multiple ailment to 5.68 lakh others.
In the curative petition, filed on the advice of Attorney-General G.E. Vahanvaiti, the CBI has sought to review the 1996 judgment of a bench, headed by former Chief Justice of India A.M. Ahamadi, diluting the charge of “culpable homicide not amounting to murder” under Section 304-Part-II to “death due to negligence” under Section 304-A of IPC. This had resulted in only two years punishment to the UCIL top officials, while the maximum sentence under Section 404-Part-II is 10 years.
Assailing Justice Ahmadi’s verdict of September 13, 1996, the CBI said the top court had “ignored” the evidence showing how the UCIL brass “deliberately omitted” rectifying the grave defects in the carbide plant due to company’s “commercial motives” despite having full knowledge about the “consequences” of such omissions, which was certain to cause deaths as they were handling deadly Methyl Iso-ciynate (MIC) gas in the plant.
“The material gathered by the CBI clearly pointed out that the accused persons had the knowledge relating to the inherent defects in the design of the plant, despite this no mitigating measures were taken,” the petition said adding that the “errors” in the apex court verdict were “apparent” and needed to be corrected.