Bhopal Gas Peedit Mahila Udyog Sangathan conferred with LIC NDTV Unsung Hero Award

The Bhopal Gas Peedit Mahila Udyog Sangathan was awarded the coveted NDTV LIC unsung Hero award at the NDTV's Indian of the Year award ceremony in New Delhi yesterday. BGPMUS is a group relentlessly working for the cause of victims of the union carbide gas disaster for the past 25 years. The organization has relentlessly drawn the attention of the authorities to the plight of the victims, due to groundwater pollution caused by the toxic waste at the abandoned Carbide plant. NDTV's Indian of the Year, one of the country's most prestigious awards, honours people for their outstanding contributions in different fields and their impact on the nation. The award recognizes those who have toiled hard, thought ahead, dared to be different and redefined the meaning of being an Indian.

The award belongs to one and only Abdul Jabbar, man who has been devotedly working for the case of gas victims. Ever since, he has been indefatigable. Through the Bhopal Gas Peedit Mahila Udyog Sangathan (BGPMUS), an organisation he set up in 1985, he has been involved with every important legal initiative taken up for the victims — from the compensation of victims to underwater contamination through the wastes lying at the Union Carbide site.

The distraught victims, gas widows, helpless people who were too weak and poor to fight for their compensation in the courts have only one person to turn to and that is Abdul Jabbar. Tehelka once wrote, “ His obduracy, his willingness to take on anyone head on for such individual cases, has meant that the bureaucracy in the state, the unfeeling medical staff at the hospitals and the corrupt clerks who take their share of the compensation meant for the victims — they all know they should not take him on. It has meant that his name has become a byword for anyone seeking help in the city.”

Abdul Jabbar is the grand man of Bhopal with a grander vision. In his own words he is a pious and sincere man who wants to uplift the affected and downtrodden people and to fight against gross irregularities in the compensation granted to the victims.

Ambreen Zaidi, Bhopal

Editor, Blogger's Park

(Ms Ambreen Zaidi is a senior journalist specialising in defence issues)

courtesy: scratchmysoul.com