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"Dow Grim Reaper"
(click here for photos; here for the press release!)

All of us here at Brown had a great time pulling off the Bhopal Halloween Day of Action! Quite a few students showed interest in what we were doing and asked about Bhopal. And yes, we did "kill" Leelee Sobieski, and then attempted to kill her a second time....

On Thursday and Friday, from BEAN and Justice for Bhopal participated in two different actions: Bhopal sidewalk chalking and street theater involving the "Dow Grim Reaper." About 6 students participated, a decent size for the just-starting-out-group.

On Thursday night, students from BEAN and Justice for Bhopal did some sidewalk chalking. We drew the outlines of bodies in chalk and wrote the name of a Bhopal victim and "Dow Shall Not Kill" inside the outline. We also wrote some sayings, such as "Got Death? Dow kills 12 Bhopalis each month. 20,000 have been killed to date. When will it stop?" and "1-2-3-4 Dow has killed and will kill some more." The chalk really got the attention of students; several stopped to ask us what we were doing as we did the chalking.

On Friday afternoon, Ryan dressed up as the Dow Grim Reaper. We'd rented a Grim Reaper costume and made Dow signs to attach to the costume. We made copies of pink slips that read "Just Another Bhopal Victim" with some information about the Bhopal disaster on the back. We aimed to "kill" 186 Brown students; an equal proportion to the numbers of Bhopalis killed by the chemical leak. Leelee Sobieski, movie star of "Deep Impact" and "Joan of Arc" fame, was one of the Brown students killed by our Grim Reaper (the Dow Grim Reaper succeeded where the asteroid failed). We even heard a student on his cell phone, on observing the "death" of another student, say "Oh, Dow just claimed another victim." While Ryan terrorized the Brown campus, I tabled and told interested students more about Bhopal. Overall, students were interested, and many were amused at the Grim Reaper, so I think the action was a success!

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"Return to Sender" at Dowpharma
(click here for photos; here for the press release!)

Here's the update from Brown...there were about six of us that visited the Dowpharma facility in Smithfield, RI. We roped off their fancy sign there with "Crime Scene: Do Not Cross" yellow caution tape, and stood in front in our biohazard suits holding a banner that listed our demands. Then we sprinted for the main door, and managed to get inside to the anteroom where there were two security guards behind the counter.

We asked: Can we speak with the plant manager, please?

Guard #1: He's not here today (yeah, right!)

Us: Can we speak with someone else?

Guard: You don't have an appointment.

We asked if he might call anyone to see if they'd meet us without an appointment. He refused. We then asked if we could make an appointment right then and we told that we'd have to call the next day to make an appointment.

We were obviously being jerked around. The second guard was nice though, and asked if we were from Greenpeace. We said no, but added that that was the first question we expected to get, and he laughed.

We told the guard that if we couldn't meet with anyone then we'd just have to leave our water and survivor testimonials with him. He got an angry look and told us we couldn't; we "came in with it and you'll have to leave with it." What he should have done, he said, was to lock the doors electronically before we could get in the building. A few of us got the uncomfortable feeling that he might like to lock us IN the building and refuse to let us go until we took the water, so we made to leave. He told us that the water and our letter would just end up in the trash can if we left, but we told him that the decision was entirely theirs, as this stuff was their property. As we left, he stood up, red in the face, and told us to take the water, but no one went back for it and he (thankfully) didn't lock us in.

On our way out we spoke with one of the employees there who was just ending his day. He didn't know anything about Bhopal, he told us, and he wanted to know more, so we told him to visit the bhopal.net website. He was a nice guy, and speaking with him about Bhopal was a nice come-down from the tension of a few moments before.

Many thanks are due in particular to Mokshay, for piloting a goliath van on the way there and back, and to Devin, our skilled and commanding photographer!

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Tabling for Bhopal; Petitions to Dow

On December 3rd, 2004, the Amnesty International chapter at Brown set up a table for the Day of Action for Bhopal. Information/posters about the disaster and some letters/petitions and postcards to Dow Chemicals were made available.

Also, a copy of the new book about Dow’s toxic legacy, Trespass Against Us, and the new film about Bhopal, Twenty Years Without Justice, were donated to the Brown University library.

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Raj Sharma Speaks About Bhopal

On March 11, 2005, H. Rajan Sharma, the attorney for the Bhopal survivors, spoke about the case at Brown in a talk entitled "Litigating Bhopal: Catastrophe, Human Rights & the Environment." Sponsored by the South Asian Student Association (SASA) at Brown, the talk drew a solid 50 people, mostly students. Mr. Sharma spoke about what happened in Bhopal and why it happened - the transfer of "untested, unproven" technology by Union Carbide and their cost-cutting prior to the accident, which eventually contributed to a complete failure of all the safety systems at the plant that night. However the economic forces that created Bhopal are still at work, and no international legal framework has been put in place to regulate international corporate behavior. "What happened in Bhopal is going to happen again - it's only a matter of time," said Mr. Sharma.

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SAATh Performs "Bhopal"

On March 12, 2005, South Asian American Theatre (SAATh) staged a performance of the play "Bhopal" by Rahul Varma - only the second time the play has been performed in the United States.

The performance, which attracted about 30 people, was sponsored by the South Asian Student Association at Brown University. The performance itself was followed by a question-and-answer session with the actors and actresses, many of them students from the Boston area. Ryan Bodanyi, the Student Coordinator for the International Campaign for Justice in Bhopal, was also on hand to answer questions about the disaster, the campaign, and what people can do to help.

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Petitioning Dow on Earth Day

On April 20, 2005, Brown University had an Earth Day festival - and the Brown chapter of Amnesty International participated by putting up a table about Bhopal. Dozens of signatures were collected for the amnesty Petition to Dow and nearly 50 postcards were signed and sent to the company!

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