Judge Rejects Bhopal Appeal by Carbide but Trims Payment
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JABALPUR, India — A judge today refused an appeal by Union Carbide Corp. to block an order forcing it to pay interim relief to victims of the 1984 Bhopal gas disaster but he lowered the amount by $78 million.
Madhya Pradesh state High Court Judge S. K. Seth rejected the Indian government’s estimates of the number of people who died or were injured in history’s worst industrial disaster. He also reduced the U.S.-based firm’s interim payment from $270 million to $192 million.
The government maintains that 2,850 people died and 200,000 were injured in the Dec. 3, 1984, leak of toxic methyl isocyanate gas from Union Carbide’s now-defunct pesticide plant in Bhopal.
Seth said he cut the amount of interim relief because available data suggested that 2,500 people died and 30,000 suffered serious injury.
Resolution of India’s $3.5-billion liability case against the company is still pending.
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