On March 17, 2004, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit reinstated some of plaintiffs’ claims against Union Carbide Corporation for ongoing, massive water pollution at its infamous plant in Bhopal, India, reversing in part a lower court’s dismissal of the case. A poisonous gas leak from this same plant killed thousands of people in 1984.

After the 1984 disaster, Union Carbide fled India, leaving vast amounts of untreated toxins at the plant site that have contaminated the drinking water supply of nearby residents. Plaintiffs, including an injured resident and a number of victims’ rights organizations, acting on behalf of a class of victims, sued to force Union Carbide to clean up its mess and compensate those injured. The district court dismissed the case, because, in its view, the named plaintiff was injured too long ago to present a claim, the organizations that filed suit were not legally proper representatives of the victims and an order that Union Carbide clean up the plant would be difficult to enforce.

The Second Circuit reversed that decision in part. It held that while the named plaintiff’s personal injury claims were time-barred, her property damage claims were not. In addition, the Court held that Union Carbide could be ordered to clean up individual victims’ property, and could also be ordered to clean up the plant site itself, if the government, which owns the land on which the plant sits, were to intervene and request such a clean-up.

EarthRights International serves as co-counsel for the plaintiffs in this case.