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SOON after the disaster, several concerned lawyers arrived in Bhopal to provide legal assistance to the gas victims. Many ‘ambulance chasers’ also swooped down on the city in that guise, motivated by greed rather than compassion.
Following the filing of many lawsuits against the Union Carbide Corporation (UCC) by victims of the disaster through private US attorneys in different districts/states of the US, the US judicial panel on multi-district litigation passed an order on February 6, 1985 transferring all US federal district court cases relating to the Bhopal disaster to the southern district court of New York.
Soon afterwards, on the plea that the ambulance chasers would misrepresent the interest of the victims, at the instance of the government of India, the President of India on February 20, 1985 promulgated the Bhopal Gas Leak Disaster (Processing of Claims) Ordinance.
The Ordinance empowered the Union of India to represent the victims in all cases relating to claims for compensation. The Bhopal Ordinance was adopted as an Act of Parliament on March 29, 1985.
Of course, there were apprehensions that the government of India may misuse the provisions of the Act and may not represent the interests of all gas victims in the best possible way. Therefore, a number of writ petitions were subsequently filed before the Supreme Court questioning the constitutional validity of the Bhopal Act.
