‘If You Drink, You Will Die’

Patna:

Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar today rejected the possibility of giving compensation to the families of those killed by spurious liquor, and said people should be “more vigilant” when the state anyway has prohibition since 2016.

At least 39 people have died in Saran district in the most recent tragedy, and the JDU-RJD government has been facing protests by the BJP in the assembly and outside over alleged laxity in implementing prohibition.

“Jo sharaab peeyega, wo toh marega hi na… Udaharan saamne hai — peeyoge toh maroge. (Those who drunk liquor will obviously die. We have an example in this case),” Mr Kumar said in Hindi in response to a question in Patna, referring to demands of compensation in earlier cases:

Nitish Kumar had lost his cool in the Vidhan Sabha over the protests and thrown a “you are drunk” jibe at the BJP members earlier this week.

Today he said grief should indeed be expressed, and then people be made aware by going to the affected places. “We have been running massive social awareness drives.” 

He argued that even when there was no prohibition, people died of toxic liquor. “People have died in huge numbers in other states as well,” he added.

There have been similar deaths in Gujarat, another prohibition state, and Punjab in recent years. 

“You know what Bapu (Mahatma Gandhi) has said (in favour of prohibition), and what research across the world shows — all of that has been sent to people’s homes — about how liquor is a bad thing, how many people die because of it. People have been dying of toxic (spurious) liquor since long, and it happens across the country,” he said.

“We have taken strict action, but people need to be more vigilant. When there’s prohibition, the liquor being sold will obviously have something wrong in it,” he further said. 

“Also, remember, you should not drink liquor anyway. Most people have agreed with the prohibition policy. But some people will make mistakes,” he argued.

Minister Sunil Kumar has, meanwhile, said the government will take strict action against those responsible for the deaths.

Bihar is one of two big states — the other being Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s home state Gujarat — that have prohibition at present. Nagaland and Mizoram have similar policies with some exceptions. 

Over the decades, states like Kerala in the south and Haryana in the north have tried the policy but had to lift it mostly because implementation was difficult.