by Annie Murray
The light is already strong, picking out sharp shadows. We pass over a flyover and Aasif is leaning in shouting something at us.
‘Over there – the company building. Union Carbide.’
Twisting round, we catch sight of the hunched, rusting skeleton of a building, standing higher than the tangle of low buildings around it.
‘Very bad,’ the auto driver shouts back to us. ‘Gas, gas – 1984.’ We have yet to discover that every driver who brings us this way will tell us, Kampani, Union Carbide, Dow, very bad. The open wound of Bhopal.
‘Yes, yes,’ we shout, as the deathly structure fades into the distance.
A few moments later we follow Aasif’s bike into a side street and pull up beside a shabby, orange-painted building. I hand rupees to our driver and he turns the little vehicle nimbly and disappears back into the street’s turmoil. On the wall in front of us, making patterns all across the peachy orange paint, are the handprints of children in varying bright colours. Painted in blue along the white border at the top, in English and Hindi, is the exhortation:
SEE THEIR ABILITIES, NOT THE DISABILITIES.
In seconds we are aware of busyness all around us. A little white van with CHINGARI TRUST painted across the front is unloading nearby. Children and a few mothers, some carrying their infants, emerge from it and hurry in through the gate and along the front of the building. A moment later the white van drives swiftly off again.
‘Come,’ Aasif says.
He leads us along the front of the building, saying good morning to people as he passes. We are in a long, stone-paved area about five metres wide covered over by a green corrugated-plastic roof that sheds a botanical light on everyone beneath. To the right, opposite the building, is a low wall with potted plants arranged along it, into which are embedded the iron struts which support the roof. And beyond it, a strip of garden, and then the main wall which divides the garden from the street.
We wait under the shady overhang, amid an atmosphere of purpose and bustling activity. Children who can walk come in from the street or from the little people carriers, greeting each other, laughing and chatting. All of them are wearing grey V-necked jumpers with a crest of some sort on the breast.
‘Is that a special uniform?’ Pat asks.
‘Yes,’ Aasif says. ‘When they are registered to come they are all allocated this – the Chingari uniform. Actually, it also makes them easier to find when we go to pick them up from the street. Now – oh, hold on . . .’ Someone is calling Aasif’s name, a middle-aged woman, beckoning him along the corridor. ‘Just wait here one moment.’
A number of women with woolly cardigans over their sarees walk back and forth, looking efficient and taking people into the building. Just outside the main door is a pile of shoes and flip-flops. One of the women comes round with little paper cups of chai and we are offered one as well.
‘Take tea,’ Aasif suggests, rejoining us. ‘And we will wait here a few minutes. People are arriving. Then we will go inside.’
As we stand watching, we begin to see the world of Chingari and what it is for – what has been done to this place. A tiny, thin woman carries a boy into the building. She has him clutched closely to her and the boy’s age is hard to guess – perhaps eight or nine. His body has a wooden stiffness. I catch a glimpse of a face, the eyes more widely spaced than would be considered ‘normal’. The woman’s exhaustion transmits itself to me. Looking after able-bodied, healthy children is tiring enough – but seems as nothing compared with this: all this lifting, struggling to feed, striving to manage, day after day after day in the summer heat, in the cramped, deprived living space of the bustees – miles of slums.
Because most of these parents are the poor. It was the people living in slums so close to the factory who took the brunt of the poison. I hear Pat make a sound, an outbreath of horror and sympathy as she catches sight of some of the children being carried in.
‘OK – come.’ Aasif takes our empty cups. We unlace our trainers and leave them by the door, following him inside.
‘We just have the ground floor here,’ he says. ‘The rest is offices. Actually, this used to be the main Sambhavna clinic until they moved to a bigger place. It is quite cramped, as you can see. There are a number of different therapy rooms and clinics and people are coming and going in the morning time, for different treatments.’ He looks gravely at us both. ‘This is the only place in Bhopal where gas- and water-affected children can have a specialized treatment for no charge. There are government hospitals but you have to pay. But those who come here have a certificate saying they are gas-affected or water-affected – and they can get treatment.’
Inside is another long corridor. The atmosphere is colourful and jolly, with a red-and-white chequered floor and lime-green walls with children’s paintings pinned up and colourful doors. On the floor on each side of the corridor are huddles of mothers and children, all waiting to be seen.
A row of lads, all wriggling and grinning, stands together signing at each other. The mothers sit chatting, some with children on their laps: the Muslim women mostly in black, the Hindu mothers in sarees and cardigans. The place is full of life and noise.
As we stand just inside the entrance amid all the activity, I become aware of an unusual movement just to my right, near the floor. Turning, I see a little girl, maybe ten years old, dressed in the Chingari jumper, her head covered by a black scarf, moving along on her belly; pulling herself, fishlike, on her arms, her legs trailing uselessly behind. She has a bright, lively expression and is clearly intent on getting somewhere. We are in a place of profound disability. And of course, ability. The lively, gesticulating boys all wear hearing aids; some of the children, locked in wooden expressions, are not speaking; others simply lie close to their mothers, limbs so wasted they are not able to get up and play.
‘Now, here –’ Aasif shows us into a small room which is remarkably quiet once the door is closed – ‘this is where we work with the deaf kids – we can do tests.’ He tells us some more before we move on into a much bigger room where several mothers are sitting cross-legged on the floor. To one side, bent over a little massage bench, one of the physiotherapists, a young woman wearing loose trousers, a blouse and headscarf, is working on a child. She glances round and smiles at us.
‘This is the sensory room,’ Aasif says. ‘You see – things for climbing, touching . . .’ There is a small wooden slide, ropes for swinging on, a big inflated ball, cushions and rugs. Against one wall is a vertical wooden frame to which a boy is strapped, standing to try and strengthen his legs. His mother sits looking up, encouraging him.
‘Bless him,’ Pat says softly. She smiles at the boy. His features are unevenly arranged, but he nods and grins, seeming to be interested in our appearance.
Pat and I move round, smiling at the mothers, exchanging a few words through Aasif.
‘There are many disabilities here,’ he says. ‘Children are still being born with deformities, with no lips, or noses – wasting in the legs, as you have seen. Many problems. Some are the children of gas-affected parents but much of it is chemicals in the water. The factory has never been cleared up and is still poisoning the water supply. For example, they have found lead in the breast milk of mothers – this is from the water. Only many years later, we have water brought into this area from elsewhere – most of the time, anyway.’
I see Pat’s face, the emotions registering in it, and I can only imagine mine looks the same. Imagine breastfeeding your child – that primal, instinctive giving of love through your body – and finding you have poisoned your baby in doing so.
Going over to the physio, we see that she is working on a little girl. The child is bone thin, and looks very frail. One side of her body is wasted, as if only half of her has truly been given life. The physio works on her weak side, bending her leg, trying to develop the muscles. The child winces, lets out a small whimper and the physio makes comforting noises.
‘You are from England?’ she as
ks us. When we nod, she says, ‘We are grateful to you guys. This is what keeps this place going – the money you raise.’
It feels so insignificant – a tiny breath in a vast world of air.
‘This little girl,’ I say, smiling down at her. She has a pink ribbon in her hair and her eyes are fixed on me, wondering, I suppose, who these pale strangers are. ‘She is . . . ?’
‘Her mother was gas-affected. She is . . . as you see. Severe wastage of the limbs and she is also deaf and dumb. We are trying to get her to walk – one day, perhaps.’
We learn that there is a pool for hydrotherapy, rooms for speech therapy, help with autism and mental-health problems, a little classroom where children can learn basic skills. Outside, at the far end of the garden, is a small playground, the play equipment surrounded by soft, pale sand. On the back wall is a beautiful mosaic of a pregnant woman, in mirror glass which catches the light. We meet some of the other parents there. Some are entertaining siblings while their child has treatment inside. I’m interested to see that there are quite a few fathers there, minding children as well.
‘My son, Sanjay, he is autistic.’ A lady comes up to me, tells me, as if she needs me to know. She is small, with a round, friendly face, and she speaks a little English. The boy, about thirteen years old, stands close to her like a wooden statue, and she ushers him about. ‘His brother is OK. But this one – very bad. No speaking – nothing.’
‘Were you here in 1984?’ I ask her.
‘Me? No. I was further out.’ She waves a hand vaguely. ‘But my husband . . .’ She shrugs, as if the rest of the story is obvious, and I don’t like to keep on at her to tell me more.
We play with children, pushing them on a little roundabout, cheering as they slip giggling down the slide. It comes easily to us – we have both brought up kids. And while it brings back memories of Paul, here my own grief feels contained by this larger grief around me and I can let it be without collapsing into it. The parents are friendly. Even talking to those with no English, we somehow manage to make something understood. Sanjay’s mother sits on the wall, her son beside her, both of them silent, watching. More people arrive, others leave. The little white people carriers come and go.
Chingari – flames. I think of all the bustees that we have seen extending away from here, the many, many other children who could be treated but for lack of space and resources. The women struggling day after day. The enormity of it all.
Pat comes over to me, her bare feet in the sand, after a conversation with another of the mothers.
‘Jesus,’ she says, her face tight with emotion. ‘Has anyone from that company ever even been here, to see what they’ve done?’
By the evening we are exhausted, jet-lagged and swamped with new impressions. We eat a bowl of fried rice and go straight back to our room.
‘Quite something for your first ever day in India,’ I say to Pat as she emerges from the bathroom.
She sinks down on the bed. She has a pale pink summer nightie on, a towel wrapped round her hair.
‘It’s very upsetting.’ She sits staring ahead. I can see how much it’s got to her, the anger she’s feeling. ‘I mean, all these years. What is it? Thirty now, more? And kids being born like that. It’s wicked – I never knew . . . I mean, if this was America they’d do something, wouldn’t they?’
‘Well, maybe.’ I lie back on the bed. ‘If the people concerned were the right colour. Dow’s poisoned things in America too – just not quite on this scale. This is the biggest industrial accident there’s ever been, I think. Dow didn’t actually own this place then. They didn’t cause it. They took over in 2001.’
Pat looks at me.
‘They bought Union Carbide’s assets,’ I explain.
‘So it’s up to them then. They wanted all the profits they could get, presumably? They ought to take the rough with the smooth.’ She adds a few choice and out-of-character expletives. ‘I’ve never seen anything like it.’
We’re silent for a moment.
‘Are you going to text Fred?’ I hold my phone up. I’ve just emailed Ian, telling him as much as I can about today, asking how he is. I’m longing to talk to him. On and off all day, I’ve been thinking, Imagine if Ian could see this. But no message could really begin to cover what we’ve seen. I do wish you were here to see, I finished it. Lots and lots of love – I miss you xxxx
Pat stares at me for a second as if she has forgotten for the moment who Fred might be. ‘Oh!’ she says, reaching for her phone. ‘Yes. Of course.’
By the next morning there’s a text from Ian.
Sounds amazing. You’ll have to tell me. Really want to hear about it. Everything OK here – cooked spag bol all by myself last night! ☺ Love you, Ian xxxx
I sit up in bed, grinning. It feels so good, getting a normal, loving message, and it makes my day. I text back: Brill to get your mssg. Will phone tonight – be in! Love, love xxx
Sod the expense. I really want to talk to him.
Thirty-Nine
Aasif has told us for that for the next two days he can be at our disposal. After that he has to look after visitors from Japan.
He turns up regular as clockwork the next morning, soon after we have finished our breakfast of eggs and toast. It feels chillier today and he is wearing a rather fetching yellow woolly hat instead of the cycle helmet.
‘So,’ he says. ‘Today we are going to see the main clinic, Sambhavna. There we will meet Nalika – she is a community health worker. We can take you to some places. And we will see the evaporation ponds.’
He sees our puzzled look.
‘The factory was putting chemical waste into ponds a distance away from the plant. But they had a very thin lining which was torn in many places – plus they flooded during the wet season. This has been a big factor in poisoning the water supply. Actually, a lot of the contents have been dug out and buried somewhere else, but you can still see what remains.’
‘We’re in your hands,’ I say and Aasif smiles.
As we pass our time with him we get to know him a little. He has a wife and two young sons in the newer part of Bhopal but comes north to work. We walk with him to find an auto rickshaw. Conversation, if any, is made at the tops of our voices, over the sounds of traffic and a building site on one corner, a cement mixer turning, drilling sounds, women smashing up piles of stones. And it is also hard to hold a conversation together since we are constantly on the lookout so as not to be mown down by something in the street.
‘Very sensible,’ I yell to Aasif. ‘Using a motorbike.’
‘Actually, I have a car,’ he shouts back as we reach the main road where it gets even noisier. ‘But I don’t use it much in the city. It is much quicker to come here on the motorcycle!’
And we are off again into the tumult, the throaty sound of the auto rickshaw in our ears, gritty air blowing in our faces, a whirl of sound, movement, smells.
I think of Ian at home, asleep, getting up later, going about his day. It’s strange how, being here, sometimes home feels very close in my mind, sometimes so far away that it is like another world and I can hardly believe it exists.
Just now I am close to it, as the little engine labours along the road, the skinny shoulders of the driver in front of us in a cheap, dark green jumper, a checked scarf at his neck billowing behind.
Further on, we pass the stall heaped with its mountain of yellow matchboxes. And I wonder if there are women all round town sitting on the floors of their houses gumming those endless numbers of little boxes together, just as the women in Dorrie’s family sat in their rooms in Birmingham, glueing by candlelight, late into the night.
We have turned into a filthy street, lined with warehouses and vehicle workshops. Lean men, bare to the waist, hammer sheets of metal and haul on the handles of carts. There is an atmosphere of oily dirt, of metal and rust and back-breaking labour. A pothole opens up in the road, so huge that the auto rickshaw has to do a swerving detour round it. Yet a moment later we are
turning in at a gate, seeing before us a brick building surrounded by trees. Everything suddenly feels serene and peaceful. The Sambhavna clinic.
‘It’s lovely,’ Pat says, seeming to be relieved after the sight of the quarter we have just ridden through. I see her clear eyes taking everything in.
An older man and woman are sitting waiting on the low wall outside, the woman wrapped in a shawl as if she is cold. Both nod to us. There are trees, and plants in pots near the steps.
For the next couple of hours we are shown round this airy building, which feels like a cross between a clinic, a school and a retreat centre. It offers free care, both Western allopathic and ayurvedic and herbal remedies. There are clinics, a dispensary, examination rooms, quarters for volunteers who work here, a herb garden, a playground. People who are able to get to the clinic wait on benches in patient lines.
‘Of course, they also do home visits,’ Aasif tells us. ‘Many people are too sick to come here. This is the only clinic in the city where treatment is free. In other hospitals it is money that talks – but many of these people are very poor. Some have been unable to work since the night of the gas. They are too sick, too weak.’
The garden, full of medicinal plants, is at the back, green and serene. There is a whole department for making herbal medicines – pans boiling up various roots, pill-pressing machines. So many people who need treatment have already suffered such a toxic overload in their bodies that Western drugs just add to their problems. Several people are working hard in the gardens. We walk round full of admiration.
‘The water for drinking here now has to come from another place – it is piped in,’ Aasif tells us. ‘If you walk the streets you will see that the water pumps are tied closed – the water supply contains dangerous levels of chemicals. But of course, sometimes the water in the pipes does not come and people are forced back to using the poisoned water for the necessities of their daily living.’
‘So people are still getting sick from it?’ Pat asks.