In Bihar, crack down on adulterated liquor

Even as the Omicron variant sweeps India, a different, yet familiar, malady is wrecking lives in Bihar: Alcohol poisoning. Over the past two weeks, roughly 30 people have died after drinking spurious liquor. In most cases, the story is familiar: Men from low-income families bought a pouch or two of locally made alcohol after a hard day’s labour, only to fall violently sick hours later, dying before their kin could rush them to the nearest hospital.

Bihar is in the sixth year of a complete prohibition on the sale, purchase, and possession of alcohol. The policy is the legacy of a poll promise by Nitish Kumar during the 2015 assembly elections. It was birthed by the longstanding agitation by women’s groups who argued that liquor was fuelling destitution and domestic violence. But its legacy is decidedly mixed. The government claims it has brought down rates of crime and alcohol-fuelled violence, and helped women and the poor. But the state’s legal machinery has often hit the news for patchy enforcement, using stringent provisions against ordinary individuals, rampant bootlegging and sale of spurious liquor that has cost hundreds of lives since 2016.

This has to change. Governments have a responsibility to safeguard public health, and unchecked adulteration of liquor has emerged as a major health crisis that has to be fought on a warfooting. Tighten vigilance, increase awareness and crack down on the easy availability of industrial alcohol, which acts as the base of most types of adulterated liquor. The response cannot be only punitive, but also factor in social and economic concerns. The human cost of not acting against this menace is simply too high.