Spurious liquor deaths

THE death of 20 persons — 18 from Yamunanagar district and two from Ambala — following the consumption of spurious liquor has led the authorities to unearth a bootlegging racket being run in the area. Unsuspecting customers were tricked into buying ‘branded’ alcohol from authorised vends as fake labels were affixed to bottles filled with spurious stuff. The law enforcement authorities need to spread their net wide and apprehend all those playing with people’s lives. A similar modus operandi was detected last month in Gurugram and Faridabad as bottles of premium liquor brands containing local and substandard brew for sale were seized. To prevent the misuse of used bottles, the authorities carried out a ‘break the neck’ campaign and smashed over two lakh of them in a week. Liquor vends and consumers would do well to destroy the empty bottles too.

However, the crackdown on the sale of cheap alcohol by rebottling means little if the bootleggers are not caught and punished. Haryana is notorious for being home to distilleries that smuggle illicit liquor to other states, including Bihar and Gujarat, where prohibition is in force. The seizure of liquor testing kits, labels and bottling machines point to a well-oiled nexus between certain distilleries, bottling plants, suppliers as well as sellers and excise and police officials. The multi-crore racket is allegedly thriving due to political patronage.

Stung by a string of fatal tragedies due to hooch, the Haryana Government had in 2020 formed a special enquiry team (SET) to probe cases of illicit liquor and smuggling. However, the SET’s recommendations for action against some officers for their dubious role in the goings-on seem to be just gathering dust. Mere bottle-breaking will not break the backbone of the mafia. Will it be business as usual till the next tragedy strikes?