Neend Udaao Andolan: Bhopali women’s responses to the ongoing environmental and health disaster surrounding the abandoned Union Carbide factory, Bhopal, India

Overview

December 2024 marks the 40th anniversary of the world’s worst industrial disaster: the toxic gas leak on 2–3 December 1984 from the US-owned Union Carbide pesticide factory in Bhopal, India. Generations of people across the world have grown up with the story of the ‘Bhopal gas disaster’ and governments have passed laws to prevent such disasters from happening again; yet what people do not realise or recognise is that Bhopal is an ongoing disaster. After that terrifying night, Union Carbide locked up its factory and left all the toxic chemicals and waste inside the factory. In 2001, it merged with Dow Chemical, another US corporation. Poisons from the abandoned factory have seeped into the soil, water, and bodies of people living around the factory. Neither Union Carbide nor its current owner Dow Chemical have taken responsibility for the ongoing disaster in Bhopal. Generations of children born to parents who live in the bastis (working-class neighbourhoods) surrounding the abandoned factory bear the toxic burden of this corporate crime in their bodies. Pregnant mothers lose sleep worrying about drinking toxin-laden water and passing it on to their unborn children. Born out of the fear of being poisoned and a sense of injustice and as they experience unconscionable foot-dragging by the courts, governments, and corporations, women from these bastis have found creative ways to be heard and to demand for one of the most essential things to survive – clean drinking water. In their collective actions, they have articulated their sense of injustice by foregrounding their practical knowledges and embodied experiences. The women of Bhopal have centred justice and dignity to create a resilient community. In this article, we will narrate the stories of their continued struggle for justice, and Bhopali women’s resilience and leadership that has led to the delivery of clean drinking water to the affected areas.