Horror worth Remembering

Pablo Bartholomew's Iconic Photograph of a child victim

On the night of 2 December,  someone started tweeting the world’s worst industrial disaster, as if it were happening live.

But exactly 30 years ago, around the same time on the same day, the Bhopal Gas Tragedy had really happened live, at the then US-owned Union Carbide factory in the Indian state of Madhya Pradesh.

It happened, perhaps, exactly as given in this deadly, chilling account by the tweeter @1984Bhopal.

Around half a million people had been exposed to the deadly fumes of the Methyl Isocyanate gas-leak. Almost 4,000 people died in the immediate aftermath, and around 10,000 subsequent deaths are blamed on this horrible disaster. The survivors’ fight for appropriate compensation is still on-going.

I was thirty years younger then, but I still remember the screaming headlines of the newspapers dated 4 December 1984.

TV news then was very new, and extremely slow. But I clearly remember, from the newspapers and news-magazines, the gut-wrenching photos of heaps of dead bodies, of people and of cattle.

You have to just google the names of photo-journalists Pablo Bartholomew and Raghu Rai - with the word ‘Bhopal’ - to see the horror they recorded for posterity.

Anyway, coming back to the tweeter, we are not very sure of the real identity. But Aziza is the name given. And here is what Aziza tweeted.

"At about 12.30 am, I woke up to the sound of Ruby coughing badly...”

"The room is filled with a white cloud. I hear a great noise of people shouting. They are yelling ‘bhaago, bhaago!’” (Run... run...).

"My son Mohsin is coughing. I am coughing too. With each breath as if we are breathing in fire. My eyes are burning".

“We are feeling worse. Mohsin has stopped groaning. He is unconscious. Mother-in-law says we must rush to Hamidia hospital".

“We start. I am carrying Mohsin. Ruby is holding my hand. Sister-in-law is also holding two children. Father-in-law is carrying a grandson”.

 “Looks like lots of others have run past us. Shoes, shawls, clothes are on the street. White clouds are everywhere”.

“People are running, screaming for help, vomiting, falling down, unconscious”.

“Mohsin & my niece are still unconscious. Ruby is holding my kurta. We manage to walk another 500 metres. Bhopal Talkies crossing”.

“Mohsin is vomiting on me. Ruby is also vomiting. I can't control my bowels. Faeces is running down my legs”.

“We must get to hospital. But we can't. We fall down. No strength. I can feel I am having a miscarriage. Blood all over my body. Around me”.

“There are people lying on the ground. They look dead. If we stay here, we will die too. We must go. We must run”.

While some gruesome details can be too disturbing to read, we must admit, the disaster is too real for us to forget.

The world does not learn its lessons quickly. In fact, just two years after Bhopal, in 1986, the Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant of Ukraine had had a radiation leakage that affected thousands - leading many to suffer and to succumb to cancer.

The Fukushima Daiichi nuclear disaster, when Tsunami hit the Japan in 2011 is an example of how, even if man is very careful, nature can sometimes turn very furious. But should we not be prepared?

Our rising dependency on chemicals, nuclear power, and related technology should create a greater accountability and responsibility from our leaders.

Our occupational Safety and Health Administration experts should never stop warning us or preparing us for the deadly harm technology can sometimes do.