Former Bhopal cop loses government job over Anderson release
By IANSTuesday, June 15, 2010
BHOPAL - The Madhya Pradesh government Tuesday sacked from a key government job Swaraj Puri, who was the city’s police chief when the Bhopal gas leak, the world’s worst industrial tragedy, occurred Dec 2-3, 1984, official sources said.
Puri, a member of the Grievance Redressal Authority of the government-run Narmada Valley Development Authority (NVDA), had dropped Warren Anderson to the airport after the former Union Carbide chief was granted bail by a city court December 7, 1984 soon after he was arrested in the case.
Puri, who was also the state’s former director general of police, lost the job in NVDA which was a minister of state rank post, mainly in view of his alleged role in dropping Anderson to the airport in his official car.
The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) government in the state decided to sack Puri amid mounting pressure from party leaders, activists and intellectuals after news channels last week aired footage of Puri seen driving Anderson in his official car and dropping him to airport, official sources said.
Poisonous methyl-isocyanate gas leaked from the Union Carbide pesticide plant here on the intervening night of Dec 2-3 night in 1984, killing nearly 3,000 people instantly and thousands over the years.
