Jairam Ramesh holds a python at Vanvihar National Park in Bhopal on Saturday. (PTI)

Bhopal, Sept. 12: Minister Jairam Ramesh and filmmaker Prakash Jha today upset Bhopal gas survivors, one playing down the continuing pollution and the other causing some of its victims to be shifted from hospital wards to allow him to shoot.

Union environment and forests minister Ramesh, after a visit to the now-abandoned Union Carbide factory, was asked when the premises might be cleansed of the toxic material still stockpiled there.

“I went inside today, touched toxic material and I am alive. I am not coughing,” Ramesh quipped, appearing to suggest the pollution was not as serious as some might think.

He added that the premises looked greener than some forests. “There was a lot of greenery,” he said, implying that if the soil and water were contaminated as alleged, the vegetation could not have come up.

Since the December 1984 leak killed an estimated 8,000 people in three days, a further 15,000 died of the gas’s long-term effects and some 100,000 continue to suffer “chronic and debilitating illnesses”, Amnesty International had reported in 2004.

“It is disgusting to hear the country’s minister for environment and forests talking in so insensitive a manner,” said Rachna Dhingra of Bhopal Group for Information and Action, an NGO working with the gas victims.

“He has no idea of the sufferings of the survivors who have been forced to drink contaminated water for over 20 years.”

Earlier, Jha had begun shooting for his film Rajneeti at the Bhopal Memorial Hospital and Research Centre — meant primarily for the gas victims — at 9am. He was filming a scene in which an injured politician (Nana Patekar) is brought to hospital.

This forced several patients and their attendants to be moved out of their wards, said Abdul Jabbar, convener of the Bhopal Gas Peedit Mahila Udyog Sangthan, who led a protest there.

Jabbar then spoke to hospital chairman and former Chief Justice of India A.M. Ahmadi, who immediately got the film unit to leave the operation theatre and critical care unit.

Till then, hospital trustee Aziz Ahmad Siddiqui had been justifying the shooting at the hospital on the ground that the film would promote Bhopal on the tourism circuit.

Hours later, Jairam continued to rile the gas victims. In a sweeping remark, he said that if the causes of the tragedy were probed, “many uncomfortable truths” would come out. He did not elaborate.

Carbide, accused of negligence and blatant violation of safety norms, had blamed disgruntled staff for the leak.

Ramesh, however, promised that if there were toxic material left in the buildings (as opposed to soil and water), it would be removed by next year.