No relief for ex-govt officials accused of facilitating

A court here today dismissed a petition filed by two former top government officials, seeking quashing of a case registered against them in connection with the escape of Warren Anderson, the prime accused in the 1984 Union Carbide gas leak case.
Additional District Judge (ADJ) R K Soni dismissed the revision petition of the then Bhopal collector Moti Singh and the then superintendent of police Swaraj Puri, paving the way for their trial.
Singh and Suri have been accused of facilitating the then Union Carbide Corporation chairman Anderson's escape.
Anderson, a US citizen, visited Bhopal in the aftermath of the gas tragedy. He was subsequently allowed to leave the city. He never returned to appear before the trial court.

Anderson was subsequently declared an absconder. He died in the US in 2013.
The ADJ upheld the order of the chief judicial magistrate against Singh and Suri, said lawyer Harish Mehta, who is representing social activists Abdul Jabbar and Shahnawaz Khan, who have filed the criminal case against the two.

Chief Judicial Magistrate Bhubhaskar Yadav, in February, had issued bailable warrants against the two accused after they failed to appear before the court twice. The sessions court had subsequently put a stay on the warrant, while hearing the revision pleas of the accused.
Puri and Singh have been charged under IPC sections 212 (harbouring an offender), 217 (public servant disobeying direction of law with intent to save person from punishment) and 221 (intentional omission to apprehend a culprit).

Toxic gas leaked from the Union Carbide's pesticide factory in Bhopal in the intervening night of December 2 and 3, 1984, killing nearly 15,000 people and maiming thousands in what is termed as the world's worst industrial disaster.