Abstract
The Bhopal disaster happened in the early hours of the morning of December 3rd, 1984. It is one of the most terrible industrial disaster or maybe even the most terrible disaster that ever happened. It took place in Bhopal which is the capital city of an Indian state called Madhya Pradesh. The factory was a Union Carbide subsidiary which produced pesticides (Temik and Sevin). Union Carbide was at the time one of the biggest American chemical firm. The subsidiary was called UCIL (Union Carbide India Limited). On its website dedicated to the tragedy, Union Carbide insists on the fact that UCIL was an Indian company and that the American firm only owned over half of the stock. The remainder of the stock was owned by Indian financial institutions and private investors. The plant was built in 1978 in Bhopal where about 300,000 people were living. It was located 5 kilometers far from the village and 1 kilometer far from the railway station. The Indian government had encouraged the building of the plant since it was trying to increase the productivity of its agricultural sector and to reach food self-sufficiency.
