Following the July 2010 district court verdict in the Bhopal gas leak case, the Supreme Court decided to re-examine its own 1996 ruling of light punishment to the accused. Should judicial activism stretch to the extent of reopening a 26-year-old case, not with the objective of seeking more compensation but to seek additional criminal punishment for the accused? Should not the activist role of the judiciary be spent on rendering justice to the victims who continue to suffer? What of the interest earned by the government from the undistributed money which was accepted in 1989 as compensation from Union Carbide? Why has the government failed to clean up the contaminated site until now?
