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| Britain used Indian troops as guinea pigs | | |
LONDON: Indian soldiers serving under the British Raj were used as guinea pigs to test the effects of poison gases on humans by scientists from the world's oldest chemical warfare research installation here in the UK, according to newly-released archival documents.
The Indian soldiers suffered severe burns from the gas as part of the trials, which started in the early 1930s and lasted almost through to Indian independence.
The trials were part of a study by British scientists to ascertain if the poison gas inflicted greater damage on coloured skins than on white Caucasians. The scientists had been posted to the Indian sub-continent to develop poison gases to use against the Japanese.
Several-hundred Indians were part of the trials, according to documents released by the UK's National Archives. It is unclear if the Indians were told about the potentially serious medical implications of the trials before they were sent into the gas chambers by the scientists from Porton Down, the UK's chemical warfare research laboratory.
On Saturday, The Guardian newspaper quoted a lawyer representing British soldiers similarly tested at Porton Dwon to say, "I would be astonished if these Indian subjects (of the Empire) gave any meaningful consent to taking part in these tests, particularly as they were conducted during the days of Empire. No one would have agreed...if they knew beforehand what was going to happen".
Mustard gas is now a recognised carcinogencic substance and the Indians suffered severe burns. Some British servicemen, recruited over time to take part in similar experiments, recently won compensation for being duped into being treated as guinea pigs.
The tests on the Indians, before and during World War II, are seen to be part of a deadly programme of identifying the exact amount of poison gas that could prove deadly on the battlefield. The British scientists, who recorded in the documents that several Indians suffered so severely they had to be hospitalised, reported a "large number" of burns.
Many of the Indians, who were sent into the gas chambers wearing no more than "drill shorts and open-necked khaki cotton shirts" to gauge the effect of mustard gas on the eyes, also had to be hospitalised after the experiment.
The revelation is seen to be a shocking after-word to the lengthy accounts of British colonial behaviour in India.
But in a sign the British authorities are unwilling to entertain claims for compensation from the affected Indian soldiers or their heirs and successors, officials are quoted to say the trials took place in a different era and the studies in India "included defensive research...(and) supported those conducted in simulated conditions in the UK in a different environment".
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