India: Death-penalty call for illegal drink sellers

A week after poisoned illegal drink killed 150 people, a state government in India wants to bring in capital punishment for suppliers involved in any future cases.

The Gujarat government is calling for a law that imposes the death penalty or life imprisonment for anyone found guilty of causing deaths through illicit alcohol.

The proposed amendment to the Bombay Prohibition Act 1949 will be to punish “anyone involved in brewing, transporting, keeping or selling the poisonous methanol-based country liquor”.

The state, where Mahatma Gandhi was born, maintains an alcohol ban but many still distil and distribute liquor illegally all over the state. Alcohol is smuggled into Gujarat from neighbouring states and is also often supplied from army areas within the state where officers are allowed to buy spirits for personal consumption.

Police and other officials are reportedly involved in the illegal business, making money when alcohol is smuggled into the state. The amendment, if passed, will make police officials liable for punishment of up to one year for negligence of duty.

It has also been claimed that Gujarat’s gangsters often start their careers as bootleggers. They, however, will not face the wrath of the new amendment to the law. The vehicles of bootleggers supplying Indian-made foreign liquor will be impounded and sold after a court judgement.

A senior government official said that the current law is not strong enough. “The existing law is extremely weak on those involved in manufacturing or distributing spurious liquor he told the Times of India.

“It provides for a maximum of one-year imprisonment.” Nearly 150 people died last week after consuming spirits that had a dangerously high content of poisonous methanol.