Will push for Anderson extradition, says PM

In his first statement on the Bhopal gas leak disaster since the verdict by a lower court early this month, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh today said the government would try to ensure a more favourable attitude from the US on the extradition of former Union Carbide chief Warren Anderson to stand trial in the case.

While the Congress party — which was at the helm at the Centre and in Madhya Pradesh in 1984 when the poisonous gas leak from the plant took place — has been facing flak in letting Anderson leave the country after arresting him, the PM said that the group of ministers which reviewed the case did not find anything on the issue as the records were not available.

Amid public uproar over delay in deciding the case, payment of low compensation to the victims and letting Anderson off the hook, the government had set up a group of ministers headed by Home Minister P Chidambaram to look into the issue.

The Centre has tried to shift the blame for Anderson leaving the country on the state government. The controversy has put the role of Rajiv Gandhi, who was then Prime Minister, under the scanner, something that the Congress party is uncomfortable with.

Asked if the Congress should come clean on the extradition controversy, Singh said: “What is the reality? We are not hiding anything… There is nothing that they (GoM) have come across by way of the definite findings as to who took the decision.”

He refused to comment on whether it was a failure of the government and the judiciary that resulted in a lower court giving its verdict more than 25 years after the gas leak.