Gas tragedy: Chouhan govt seeks relief for 20 new wards

Saturday’s ‘rail roko’ had been called off only after Chief Minister promised the protesters that he will take up with the Centre their demand for giving death compensation to even those victims who lost their lives after being compensated in the ‘partial disability’ and ‘permanent disability’ categories.

Chouhan on Sunday demand that even the remaining 20 wards should be declared gas-affected. In 1982,residents of only 36 wards were found eligible for compensation. Only 6,000 residents out of four lakh residents of the remaining 20 wards had been found eligible while claims of the rest were summarily rejected.

“The impact of gas can’t be restricted within geographical confines of wards,” Chouhan said.

The BJP has always claimed that it was not logical to leave out many localities because the gas spread uniformly.

Activists like Abdul Jabbar have argued that demands like these take their toll on those who were genuinely affected. “They are taking people for a ride because the judicial process is already over,” Jabbar once told this paper.

Even the Supreme Court has never found the demand tenable in several of its judgments.

In 2006,the ruling BJP had passed a non-official resolution in the Assembly that sought to declare the remaining 20 wards as gas-affected.