More than 100 people have lost their lives after consuming spurious liquor supplied by the liquor mafia in Taran Taran, a district located in the Northern Province of Punjab. The irony is that since the corona virus’s inception in India (March 2020) 10 people have lost their lives to the so called “virus with no present cure” in Taran Taran in the past 5 months whereas, a whopping 100 people have lost their lives within a couple of days after consuming spurious liquor.
Who started this mafia?
Who funds and controls it?
What has the government done about it?
Is this the first time this has happened in Punjab?
And many other important questions will be answered through a series of exclusive reports.
A family residing near Sachkhand Road in Taran Taran lost their “sole breadwinner” Piara Singh, after he consumed spurious liquor. People found him lying dead in an open field the next morning. They say that when they found him, his body was as stiff as a plank. He has left behind a wife and two young children. He had plans to marry his daughter this year but now his wife who is a home maker says that she doesn’t know what she is going to do with her life.
The cremation grounds on the Sachkhand Road were flooded with bodies on the 1st of August. Usually cremation grounds have space for up to 4 cremations at a single time but on Saturday, people had to wait for their loved ones to be cremated. One of these people was a 10 year old child along with his 3 younger siblings aged 5, 4 and 2. His father died after consuming spurious liquor supplied by the liquor mafia and his mother, grief stricken, died from a heart attack the very same day. The 4 minor children have now been orphaned. None of their relatives are ready to shelter them with one of their paternal uncle’s saying- “I don’t have the time to attend the funeral (of his father) as I’m busy with the construction work that is presently going at my residence”.
Another maternal relative also refused to shelter the grief stricken young ones by saying- “I’m barely making ends meet, how am I supposed to take care of these four? They’re on their own now!”
After their parents were cremated, their landlord kicked
them out and tossed their furniture on the streets. The 4 minor children who
had just started their life’s journey have been dealt with a massive jolt. Who is to blame? What has the government
done for them?
It had rained earlier that night and the ashes of the people
who were cremated that day washed away with the rain into the drains nearby.
Their loved ones not only lost someone who was dear to their heart but didn’t
even have the opportunity to collect their ashes! If this isn’t misfortune then what is?
200 meters away from the cremation grounds is the house of
another unfortunate soul who lost her husband. She told us that after her
husband consumed the spurious liquor, his stomach started aching which was
followed by vomiting, loss of sight and eventually death. While speaking to us
she said that the local authorities tried to silence her voice by saying- “It’s no use revolting or complaining. As it
is, you’re not going to get any compensation from the government. You might as
well mind your own business!”
Bodies were lying on the floor at the Taran Taran Civil Hospital. Some of them were kept outside the precincts of the hospital under the hot sun with authorities asking them to “get their own ice” for the deceased. Bodies were being mistreated left, right, and center and when the families of the deceased tried to speak up against the disrespectful treatment of their beloved’s mortal remains, doctors threatened to report them the authorities if they didn’t “shut up”.
The authorities on the behest of the acting government did not conduct any post mortem report of the people who died after consuming the poisoned liquor fearing that the autopsy report would reveal it all!
A congress MLA’s P.A who goes by the name of “German” later
arrived at the civil hospital and threatened, manhandled, and slapped a couple
of people present at the hospital and asked them to call a cab and “get lost with the bodies”.
One woman who lost her husband said that German asked her to take her husband’s body back home and if she didn’t, he would “abduct the woman”.
In the mortuary, more than 20 bodies were lying on top of each other on the floor due to insufficient space and lack of basic equipments such as beds.
When the kin of the deceased requested the hospital authorities to provide them with an ambulance, they reportedly told them to make their own arrangements as they didn’t have an extra ambulance and the one that they had (just a single ambulance!) was being used for COVID patients.
This isn’t the first time people in Punjab have lost their lives thanks to the “liquor mafia”. Similar instances were reported in 2003, 2010, and 2012 but the government (like it has this time) decided to turn a blind eye to the incident.
Why you may ask?
Because the government along with dubious political leaders, police officers, prominent figures, gangsters and hooligans are all in on it. They are the ones who manufacture, fund, market and supply the “Illicit Liquor”.
Also Read: Liquor Mafia: ED reveals more than 25 prominent politicians are involved in money laundering scam
The liquor war reportedly sold in small plastic carrier bags at a rate of 20 rupees/-
The government reportedly earns 6-7 thousand crore rupees from the liquor industry but such dubious and illegal activates tend decrease its overall earnings.
For producing such spurious liquors, distilleries (owned by prominent figures/ leaders) in Punjab mix a whopping 11,300 liters of methyl to 3,700 liters of alcohol to create 15 thousand liters of this deadly poison and sell it at the rates similar to your average “packet of wafers”.
They lure naïve people by claiming to provide them with something that is better than imported liquor and “pocket friendly” at the same time. Little do these people know that it would turn out to be the final time they’d get to “clink their glasses”.