Tainted-liquor deaths rise to 93 in India

GAUHATI, India — At least 93 people have died and about 200 people have been hospitalized after drinking tainted liquor in India’s remote northeast, authorities said Saturday.

The victims of one of the deadliest bootleg liquorrelated incidents ever in India were mostly tea plantation workers in Golaghat and Jorhat districts in Assam state, government official Julie Sonowal said.

Assam is India’s largest tea-growing state, with more than 1,000 plantations producing more than 50 percent of Indian tea.

The workers consumed the liquor laced with methyl alcohol, a chemical that attacks the central nervous system, on Thursday and started falling unconscious. They were rushed to hospitals and the death toll rose to 93 by Saturday, according to Assam Home Commissioner Ashutosh Agnihotri.

Himanta Biswa Sharma, Assam’s health minister, said about 200 people who fell sick after drinking the toxic liquor are in hospitals, some in critical condition.

Manab Gohain, a doctor at Jorhat Medical College Hospital, said 34 patients had died in a 24-hour period.

The owner of a brewing unit and eight others have been arrested, police official Mukesh Agarwal said. Agarwal said police are pursuing other people believed to be connected to the illegal brewing as part of an ongoing investigation.

AP/DIEU NALIO CHERY Demonstrators in Port-au-Prince, Haiti, arrive at the National Palace on Friday with a coffin containing the body of a protester who was killed last week. Citizens have been gathering to protest skyrocketing inflation and the government’s failure to prosecute embezzlement from a Venezuelan program that sent discounted oil to Haiti.