Carbide criminal case hearing postponed

Bhopal, Apr 17 (UNI) A local court today fixed the next hearing in the criminal case relating to 1984 Bhopal Gas Tragedy to May 8 and 9.

Chief Judicial Magistrate Anil Kumar Gupta postponed the hearing as most of the accused, including the then UCIL Chairman Keshub Mahindra, didn't turn up and applied for exemption from personal appearance.

The statements of the accused had to be recorded today. Besides Mahindra, other accused are Vijay Gokhale, Kishore Kamdar, S P Choudhary, J Mukund, K V Shetty and A K Srivastava.

The lone accused present was the then UCIL shift incharge Shakil Ibrahim Qureshi.

In March, all the accused had recorded their statements in the court.

Few thousand people were killed and several lakhs affected as about 40 tonnes of toxic methyl isocyanate leaked from the Bhopal pesticide plant of multinational Union Carbide Corporation on the intervening night of December 2-3, 1984.

UNI AG-PS RL RAI1534