Thaindian News

Ahmedabad, July 9 (IANS) Gujarat closed down 1,200 liquor dens and arrested over 800 illegal brewers in a massive crackdown as the death toll after drinking moonshine rose to 84 Thursday.
Embarrassed by the scale of the tragedy in a state where consumption and sale of liquor is officially banned, the police swept through the state in search of those illegally selling home-made liquor.

Nearly 170 people were still warded in four hospitals of Ahmedabad, some in critical condition. From the time people began dying Monday, the number of fatalities has mounted rapidly.

A home department official monitoring the police raids said: “A majority of those arrested deal in country liquor in ghettos in cities, townships and villages.”

More than 1,000 police personnel have formed teams in all districts to crack down on illegal liquor dens, which have proliferated in the state on account of the official ban on liquor.

The ban is in deference to Mahatma Gandhi, a Gujarati who was passionately opposed to liquor.

This has led to a proliferation of illegal liquor dens, whose home-made brew is mostly consumed by those from low income families who can’t afford high priced drinks available outside the state.

The death toll meanwhile mounted to 84 here in one of Gujarat’s worst such tragedies.

The government has asked Principal Secretary (Health) Amarjit Singh to supervise the treatment of patients in the Civil Hospital, Shardaben Hospital, LG Hospital and VS Hospital.

A Congress-sponsored general strike evoked only a partial response in the areas of Odhav, Amraiwadi and Nikol in eastern Ahmedabad where most people have died.

All three areas are thickly populated and are home to numerous small scale industries that employ thousands of labourers.

Among the first to be arrested was Harishankar Kahar alias Hari, a notorious player in the illegal liquor industry. He was detained Wednesday night.

But police sources say they don’t know who supplied the killer drink.

“We have nabbed the key suspect and he is cooperating with the investigation,” a police officer said. “But he has not revealed anything about the original supplier of the killer brew.”

He said Kahar was arrested from Odhav locality and claimed that “raids conducted at his den have resulted in hundreds of litres of country liquor getting seized”.

These had been reportedly stored in a number of containers.

The government has announced a four-member commission headed by a former Gujarat High Court judge to probe the tragedy. It will submit its findings by Nov 30.

“The leads being provided by Kahar could prove useful to track the network of bootleggers in Gujarat,” the Crime Branch official said.

“However, the scale of the tragedy in Ahmedabad will now make us look for dens which have been activated after the Lok Sabha elections in the interior areas.”

In Gandhinagar, the state assembly witnessed uproarious scenes, forcing Speaker Ashok Bhatt to suspend all Congress legislators except opposition leader Shaktisinh Gohil for disrupting the session over the deaths.