A familiar tragedy- At least 20 people died in Bihar's Saran district on Wednesday, a day after consuming spurious liquor at a local joint.
- Victims had complained of uneasiness, nausea, breathlessness, stomach pain and blurry vision.
- Back in August, eleven people had died and 12 had fallen seriously ill, many of them losing their eyesight in the same Saran district after consuming spurious liquor.
- Earlier, 37 people died in March, six in January and 30 in November 2021 — all due to hooch consumption.
Politics over poison- The hooch deaths triggered a political slugfest, with BJP leaders saying that the prohibition policy has failed. Union minister Giriraj Singh said, “If a policy is not successful, then it should be reconsidered.”
- Even JDU MLA Sanjeev Kumar said, “Liquor ban has completely failed in Bihar and Dalit and extremely backward class people are becoming the victims of the law. We need to review the law.”
- Bihar CM Nitish Kumar, who lost his cool in the assembly, shouted at his rivals saying, “Sharabi ho gaye tum log...Ab tolerate nahi kiya jaayega.”
Fact-sheet- Hooch is an inferior quality liquor, which is brewed in small unregulated shanties, and does not attract excise tax, hence cheaper than proper alcoholic drinks.
- The sale and consumption of alcohol were banned in Bihar by the Nitish government in April 2016.
- The policy has led to clogging of the courts, as then CJI NV Ramana complained in December 2021, with 3.5 lakh prohibition cases and over 4 lakh arrests.
State of hooch deaths- A Lok Sabha report, released in July, said over 6,000 people died in five years — 2016-20 — due to hooch consumption, the lowest figure reported in 2020 at 947.
- Madhya Pradesh, Karnataka, Punjab, Chhattisgarh and Bihar are the top five states with maximum reported deaths.
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