RAD­HI­CA DE SIL­VA

Se­nior Mul­ti­me­dia Re­porter

rad­hi­ca.sookraj@guardian.co.tt

As the sec­ond an­niver­sary of the Paria div­ing tragedy was ob­served, at­tor­ney Prakash Ra­mad­har post­poned lit­i­ga­tion as he con­tin­ued to seek an ex gra­tia pay­ment for sur­vivor Christo­pher Boodram and the be­reaved fam­i­lies.

Speak­ing at a press con­fer­ence held at his San Fer­nan­do of­fice yes­ter­day, Ra­mad­har said he had planned to ini­ti­ate le­gal ac­tion be­fore the an­niver­sary but de­cid­ed against it.

Say­ing a lengthy tri­al will serve no one’s in­ter­est, Ra­mad­har ex­plained that he was giv­ing Paria Fu­el Trad­ing Com­pa­ny an ul­ti­ma­tum to de­clare whether they will pay the ex gra­tia pay­ment and bring an end to any lit­i­ga­tion. 

“At­tor­neys wrote to the cor­po­rate sec­re­tary of Paria on Feb­ru­ary 2 in­di­cat­ing the is­sue of ex gra­tia pay­ment is what we were seek­ing for the fam­i­lies we rep­re­sent, if it was go­ing to be paid or not. One would ex­pect that the right and de­cent thing to do, hav­ing re­gard to the cir­cum­stances of this tragedy, would have been for Paria and LM­CS to do right and make an ex gra­tia pay­ment,” Ra­mad­har ex­plained.

He not­ed that the court must be used on­ly as a last re­sort, not as a first ac­tion.

 “We know the de­lays in court can be over­whelm­ing, and for those who have lim­it­ed or no re­sources, it could be an act of suf­fo­ca­tion. It is a slow-burn­ing crime for this mat­ter not to be re­solved, and for every day that pass­es, adds to the or­gy of hor­ror and shame­less­ness that we now see in this so­ci­ety,” he added.

Al­though his team stood ready for lit­i­ga­tion, Ra­mad­har said he had not heard back from Paria’s board.

 How­ev­er, he said at­tor­neys from the law firm John­son, Ca­ma­cho, and Singh wrote say­ing there is con­sid­er­a­tion for the pro­pos­al. 

“We will await un­til the end of busi­ness to­day, and if it is that we do not hear from Paria in re­la­tion to the ex gra­tia pay­ment, we may very well have to ap­proach the Prime Min­is­ter and his of­fice and the line min­is­ter to ask them to give a di­rec­tive to Paria as to what de­ci­sions they should take,” he said.

He not­ed that the Prime Min­is­ter’s re­cent state­ment was the rea­son he de­cid­ed not to file lit­i­ga­tion as yet. 

“The Prime Min­is­ter said this tragedy was a le­gal mat­ter of li­a­bil­i­ties and re­spon­si­bil­i­ties, and it would be quite un­usu­al at this stage for the Gov­ern­ment to over­ride the re­spon­si­bil­i­ty and role of the board and oth­er en­ti­ties in­volved,” Ra­mad­har re­called.

He added, “Paria’s Board must make a de­ci­sion, one way or the oth­er.”

Boodram, Fyzal Kur­ban, Kaz­im Ali Jr, Rishi Nages­sar, and Yusuf Hen­ry had been do­ing main­te­nance works in­side a 36-inch pipeline on Feb­ru­ary 25, 2022, when they were sucked in. Boodram made it out alive and said he told the Paria team that his col­leagues were right be­hind him. How­ev­er, Paria ex­ec­u­tives de­cid­ed against send­ing any­one back in­to the pipeline.

Fol­low­ing the CoE, a rec­om­men­da­tion was made for Paria to face charges of cor­po­rate manslaugh­ter.