A leading advocate for the survivors of the 1984 Bhopal disaster is calling on India to boycott the 2012 Olympic Games in London because Dow Chemical is an official sponsor of the event. On December 3, 1984, around 40 metric tons of toxic gases leaked from a Union Carbide plant in Bhopal. The Indian government said soon afterward that around 3,500 people died, but campaigners estimate the total number of dead due to the leakage at 25,000, with many people still suffering. Years after the leak, Dow Chemical bought Union Carbide. Satinath Sarangi is an activist with the Bhopal Group for Information and Action.

Satinath Sarangi, Bhopal Group for Information and Action activist: “We are opposing Dow Chemical’s sponsorship of the Olympic Games because Dow is still running away from its legal liabilities towards the victims of Bhopal, the worst industrial disaster in history. Dow, as the owner of Union Carbide Corporation, Dow Corporation is legally liable to compensate for the deaths of over 25,000 people and the poisoning and continued sickness among half-a-million people in Bhopal.”