Bhopal Gas Tragedy and Ethical Failures: A Case Study of Union Carbide

This report provides a detailed analysis of the ethical issues surrounding the Union Carbide and the Bhopal gas tragedy. It examines the company's ethical position, highlighting various loopholes and failures in ethical considerations and principles, such as the neglect of safety measures, inadequate employee training, and lack of corporate social responsibility. The report discusses the factors contributing to the disaster, including cost-cutting measures, improper site selection, and miscommunication, and emphasizes the importance of ethical principles, proper maintenance, and government oversight in preventing such tragedies. The conclusion underscores the need for organizations to prioritize workplace safety and implement scheduled maintenance to ensure employee well-being and prevent future disasters. The report also highlights the role of the local government and the importance of employee training in mitigating the impact of such events.

ETHICAL ISSUES AT
UNION CARBIDE

Table of Contents
INTRODUCTION...........................................................................................................................3
MAIN BODY...................................................................................................................................3
Ethical position of Union carbide company.................................................................................3
CONCLUSION................................................................................................................................7
REFERENCES................................................................................................................................1

INTRODUCTION
Business ethics and ethical consideration are very important to be followed by every company.
This is not just for the accomplishment of objectives or building good image but it is the morale
duty of every company be a follower of ethics in its working operations. This report will study
about the concept of business ethics and ethical consideration along with its importance in
operation of company's business with contrast of Bhopal gas tragedy which is one of the biggest
tragedy of the industrial world. This report, will also discuss various ethical loopholes and issues
that was persisting in the Union Carbide.
MAIN BODY
Ethical position of Union carbide company
Ethical consideration or ethical principles are very essential for every company to follow
and implement in its working structure. It will not only help the company in building good image
but it will help them in meeting unforeseen situation and tragedies. At the time of occurring such
tragedy ethical position of the company was not good. It has neglected and overlooked many
important ethical considerations and principles (Ferrell, 2019). There are various loopholes or
ethical considerations were missing at the time of occurring of tragedy.
Bhopal gas tragedy is considered as one of the worst industrial disasters across the globe
which happen in December 1984 at Union Carbide India Ltd. (UCIL) because of the leakage of
methyl gas which spread into the residential areas and which has affected more than 500,000
people's lives (Le Menestrel, 2021). The disaster made a significantly dangerous impact on the
lives, may people lost their precious lives and caused company very large huge amount of capital
loss. One of the prime factor for the cause of this incident is considered to the casual avoidance
of safety issues by the UCIL. The company tend to continue its operations with totally neglecting
the scheduled maintenance and repairing of the machinery.
It was seems that employees were not be given proper training to execute their work.
Since at that time company was following the policy of cost-cutting and due to that it was not
taking care of its employees in terms of providing them accurate training. It is also noted that
company has reduced its training schedule during that time which result in lack of learning and
skill development among employees/ labours. Lack of training towards performance of work or

lack of training in terms of leaning safety measures are said to be most important and significant
loopholes or non concentration of ethics by company. Company was also not following the
principle of providing training to employees regarding using of safety equipments and basic
working of it (Colzato and Hommel, 2021).
While following the policy of cost-cutting, company was also not looking at its internal
management. This means that lack of safety equipment were also become a major reason due to
which lives of many employees comes to danger. Water sprays or flare tower were also not
working properly by which life of many employees could be saved if they are in proper
condition. Lack of safety towards health and security, one of the important ethical consideration
was not being followed by the company at the time of occurrence of such tragedy. (Companies)
has also not replaced its safety equipment which is being old and outdated. Due to this reason
also life of many people put into danger. Non considering and without looking at its current
situation of equipments also create such situation that at the time of its actual need they were of
no use. It is also to be considered that one of the important ethical consideration in the form of
non occurrence of any harm was also being not followed or overlooked by company (Sison,
Ferrero and Guitián, 2018). Since due to various loopholes of company this tragedy occurs which
has caused severe harm to employees and other labours.
Apart from that it is also noted that company instead of taking own responsibility has
denied and said that it all occurs due to carelessness or mistake of worker. This is also said and
considered as a mistake of the company that it was all occurred due to lack of knowledge and not
because of the worker's fault. Company has also not given any information and knowledge to its
employees that what they have to do to deal and control such situation.
Company had also not given proper information to other people regarding MIC and
safety measures. Due to lack of information people didn't get chance to recover and maintain
their personal safety (Greenwood and Freeman, 2018). Hiding of information regarding MIC is
also said to be a violation of one of the important ethical consideration. Concept of corporate
social responsibility was also being neglected by company. This means that company has not
meet its responsibility towards society by adopting the practice of non sharing of important
information with society and setting up industry at such place where large number of population
already lives. Being an industry dealing in such harmful gas including methyl and operation of
business at such populated place would be considered as a major loophole or non consideration

of ethical consideration. It would not be wrong to say that this whole tragedy is also an outcome
of company's framework and policies or its management practice in addition to ethical
consideration.
One more loophole that can be seen is choosing of wrong method of raising funds. There
are various methods by which company can raise funds including selling of unused assets or any
other mode. But, company has chosen cost-cutting technique for raising its fund and maintaining
its funds. This would be considered as a good practice but not above the life and health of its
workforce or employees. Company while following this practice has not given adequate training
to employees or spend less in maintaining its safety equipments. And this practice is only
become liable for the occurrence of such big tragedy.
Miscommunication and time differentiation is also a major issue that can be held
responsible for the tragedy. As during the occurring of this tragedy when worker come to know
about the happening of event then due to lack of proper communication and time differentiation
this occurrence would not been able to mitigated. As a result of that this has turned into such a
big tragedy.
However, it would be noted that adoption and implementation of adequate ethical
principles will help the company not only in protecting the life of employees but it may also help
it in occurrence of such tragedy. This means that if company would follow ethical consideration
in the form of providing adequate training to its employees regarding working as well as safety
(Trevino and Nelson, 2021). Along with this if company will take care regarding condition of its
infrastructure in the form of looking at the availability and quality of safety equipments will also
at certain extent protect it from such bad impacts and harm.
The tragedy could have been avoided by the organization's technical team if they would
have done a timely monitoring of the gas storages and also make sure that the safety mechanisms
are properly working. In the present time also organizations often tend to neglect the scheduled
maintenance of the machineries and equipments. This happens because during the period of
maintenance the overall work productivity is stopped and also company has to make capital
investments in the repairing of the equipments and machineries due to which if is often avoided
(Shah and et.al, 2018). This is a main reason why UCIL was in the main ethical position for the
avoidance of accidents like this. Company's engineering and infrastructure developing staff is
also in the main consideration for being responsible for the number of the tragedy. This is done

because in the situation of leakage of the gas the harmful material could have been transferred
into other location or being stopped for spreading all across the area. Due to this improper
development of infrastructure and completely avoidance of the safety precaution the gas continue
to leak all across the residential area. The the responsible organizational employees for
instalment of this plan could have implemented different technological precautions which are
quick acting and also accurate in terms of avoiding the disaster.
The local government is also in the ethical position for the avoidance of the tragedy
because the responsible government officers were not accurately monitoring the avoidance of
health and safety measure which were done by the company. This lack of governing the
o0rganizational working by the local officers has limited company in reminding the maintenance
which has to be done of the container. With that the local government officer must have closely
evaluated the infrastructure of the developing chemical plant of the UCIL due to which company
developed a sense of avoiding the expenditures for maintenance and resulting disaster. However
large organizations like UCIL often tend to implement bribery for avoiding the monitoring done
by the government officers, this is often done because bribery leads of avoidance of facing
penalties which company has to pay for not following the governmental rules and regulations
(Hanley, 2020).
Improper site selection is also considered as one of the main reason for the activities like
this, because UCIL plant at which the Bhopal gas tragedy happened was extremely near the
residential area due to which high loss of civilian lives can be seen. Thus UCIL could have
installed its responsible plan at a distance location from the residential area through which the
accident's impact could have been minimized (David, Mayes and Coppola, 2020). Also the
government must have monitored the land allotment procedure through which company could
have found its desired land location and also the land buying cost can also be reduced as
compared to buying land in the middle of the city.
Union Carbide India Limited (UCIL) is still into the highest consideration for the act
because company tend to sell its products globally because of which it should have monitored its
product development plant and monitored the work capability. With that the company also tend
to reduce its expenditures done in the development of the products through which it can achieve
high level of economic advantage but due to this cost cutting organizational employees tend to
avoid the costly maintenance for the containers.

Improper employee selection and lack of employee training, are another factor which
showcases that UCIL was completely avoiding the governments health and safety laws because
of which the company is one of the sole responsible culprit the loss of several lives caused in
Bhopal, Madhya Pradesh, India. This is an important factor the loss which happened because the
night staff working in the organization was unaware of the precautions measures which are
responsible for the avoidance of the disaster (Le Menestrel, 2021). With this limited information
of the required actions miscommunication among employees also played a significant role in
increasing the impact on the residential area. This is important employees working in the night
shift were unaware of the steps which had to be taken through which the tragedy could have been
avoided and also they were not able to establish communication with the employees of higher
position for taking appropriate suggestions. This miscommunication among employees and lack
of training regarding the awareness has lead to a high level spread to the highly toxic methyl
isocyanate (MIC) gas.
CONCLUSION
From the evaluation it can be concluded that organizations like UCIL often tend to avoid
the scheduled maintenance of their work areas because of which workplace dangers often
increase and also with that it makes negative impact on employee's work productivity because
they are constantly working in a threat of getting hurt. Thus company must evaluate its
workplace and has to implement scheduled maintenance of the workplace to ensure that overall
safety is being established. With that the local government and responsible officers must also
govern the working which organizations are doing through which it can ensure that people in the
residential area are safe.

REFERENCES
Books and journals
Colzato, L.S. and Hommel, B., 2021. The future of cognitive training. In Cognitive training (pp.
397-410). Springer, Cham.
David, A., Mayes, A.S. and Coppola, E.C., 2020. The Effect of Live Theatre on Business
Ethics. Humanistic Management Journal. 5(2). pp.215-230.
Ferrell, and et.al., 2019. Business ethics, corporate social responsibility, and brand attitudes: An
exploratory study. Journal of Business Research.95. pp.491-501.
Greenwood, M. and Freeman, R.E., 2018. Deepening ethical analysis in business ethics. Journal
of Business Ethics.147(1). pp.1-4.
Hanley, B.J., 2020. What Caused the Bhopal Gas Tragedy? The Philosophical Importance of
Causal and Pragmatic Details.
Le Menestrel, M., 2021. Corporate Social Responsibility: The Bhopal Gas Tragedy (Video, Case
Study & Discussion)(October 2nd, 2012)–Marc Le Menestrel.
Le Menestrel, M., 2021. Goals, Processes and Rationality: A Parable and a Framework (Video,
Case Study & Lecture) Friday 26th of April 2013–Marc Le Menestrel.
Shah, N. and et.al, 2018. Comparison of the outcomes of home based and supervised
individually designed exercise programme amongst the patients in chronic phase after
Guillain Barre Syndrome: study protocol for a randomized control trial. International
Journal of Clinical Trials. 5(1). pp.60-6.
Sison, A.J.G., Ferrero, I. and Guitián, G. eds., 2018. Business ethics: A virtue ethics and common
good approach. Routledge.
Trevino, L.K. and Nelson, K.A., 2021. Managing business ethics: Straight talk about how to do
it right. John Wiley & Sons.
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