Absolving the late Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi of having played any role in former Union Carbide chief Warren Anderson’s quiet exit from India, former Madhya Pradesh chief minister and sitting Rajya Sabha MP Arjun Singh on Wednesday put the ball in Prime Minister Manmohan Singh’s court.

Mr Singh, who was MP CM when Mr Anderson was allowed to leave the country, told the Rajya Sabha that the PM should take up afresh the issues of Mr Anderson’s extradition and compensation for the gas tragedy victims with US President Barack Obama when the latter visits India in November.
The Congress leader, who is rarely seen in the Rajya Sabha, surprised many by putting in an appearance in the House on Wednesday to participate in the debate on the Bhopal gas tragedy. Incidentally, he has spoken out for the first time after the Bhopal court announced its verdict in the case this year allowing Mr Anderson to go scot-free.
Mr Singh said Mr Anderson was “directly responsible” for the tragedy and the government should push for his extradition and seek “adequate and full” compensation for the tragedy. While choosing to praise Rajiv Gandhi, Mr Singh pointed fingers at the then home minister, the late P.V. Narasimha Rao, for Mr Anderson’s escape.
Mr Singh narrated in detail how he took it upon himself and ordered the arrest of Mr Anderson as soon as he landed on “Indian soil”. “I did not share my decision with anyone and called in the officers. I gave both of them orders in writing because I knew of the tremendous pressure they might be under and so that the responsibility is mine,” he said. The former chief minister said he later informed Rajiv Gandhi, who was in Harsud, in Hoshangabad district of the state, when Mr Anderson was arrested.
Mr Arjun Singh said Rajiv Gandhi heard him out without comment but did not show a “flicker of any kind of sympathy for anyone, much less Anderson”. Mr Singh said his chief secretary informed him that there had been persistent calls for granting bail to Mr Anderson from home ministry officials in Delhi. “Then he (Anderson) went back,” Mr Singh said without elaborating. He emphasised that he told the state chief secretary “that he can do whatever he likes, but the arrest be duly recorded so that we can summon him whenever we want”. Mr Singh also expressed his displeasure at Mr Anderson being flown from Bhopal to Delhi in a government plane. It was “incongruous that Anderson took a state plane to leave Bhopal,” he said, adding that he “did not want to enlarge on these things as it would add grief and bitterness”. A stunned BJP, which sat silently through Mr Singh’s speech, claimed the Congress leader had conveniently shifted the blame onto people who are no longer alive. Both P.V. Narasimha Rao and the then MP chief secretary are no more. “His (Arjun Singh’s) statement is concealing more than revealing. When the PM had no sympathy, then why did he listen to the home minister (Narasimha Rao),” questioned Leader of the Opposition in the Rajya Sabha Arun Jaitley.
Mr Singh was known to share a strained relationship with Narasimha Rao during his days as HRD minister in Rao’s Cabinet at the Centre later. In his speech, which lasted more than half an hour, Mr Singh made references to Rajiv Gandhi several times, explaining the grief of the former Prime Minister at the Bhopal tragedy. However, there was only one oblique reference to Narasimha Rao. “Attaching motive to the then Prime Minister would be a figment of the imagination of persons who can see nothing constructive of a person of that stature,” he said. Also choosing to take the Opposition’s scathing attacks on himself, Mr Singh said, “I am not shifting any blame on anybody. Whatever is the blame, I am ready to suffer as an ordinary citizen. The clamour for my speaking out should now subside.”
Responding to charges that his government had provided protection to Mr Anderson as soon as he landed in Bhopal, Mr Singh said many people, particularly the next of kin of those who had died, had gathered outside the airport upon Mr Anderson’s arrival and would have “lynched him from the nearest lamp-post”. He said he carried out his job “with a heavy heart” in order to prevent any physical or personal harm to the then Union Carbide chief. He said Mr Anderson was arrested and escorted by state police officials to a guest house and that Mr Andersen, whom he sarcastically described as “Bada Saheb”, had the audacity to come to Bhopal after the tragedy even though he was directly responsible for it. “He could not be coming to share our grief,” Mr Singh said. After his arrest, while being escorted to the rest house, Mr Anderson kept asking why the CM was not saving him. “That is the kind of arrogance these people have,” he said.
“I do not want to lay blame on any side in the hope of a bargain,” he said.
The former MP CM said the allegations against him were started by a handful of people. “In our country, gossip has a stronger force than reason,” Mr Singh said, adding that he had set up a commission of inquiry which could begin by questioning himself.
Mr Singh, however, said the UPA government is committed to securing Mr Anderson’s extradition and that he has no opinion on how it should be done. “The people responsible know how it is to be done,” he said, adding that India had an “unspoken promise” from the US on Mr Anderson’s extradition. He said news reports had quoted President Obama as saying, “Let somebody make reference to us (about Anderson), then we will see.” “Adequate and full compensation can be asked of him (Mr Obama),” Mr Arjun Singh said.