Just a month after the government declared in the Assembly that hooch tragedies were a thing of the past in Tamil Nadu, twin hooch tragedies in the State claimed 22 lives and left 45 others hospitalised. Several others are under treatment, fighting for their lives, already blinded by the methanol they had consumed.
While the kin of those who died or hospitalised were stunned, the bureaucracy and the administration wondered how bootleggers in Villupuram and Chengalpattu districts had access to so much methanol when its retail sale is banned by the Tamil Nadu Prohibition Act. The Tamil Nadu Denatured Spirit Methyl Alcohol and Varnish (French Polish) Rules, 1959, also makes it clear that methyl spirit cannot be consumed by humans and regulates it with sales and storage licences.
The police swung into action and got hold of Elayan Nambi, a chemical engineer, who admitted to having sold barrels of methanol to an agent in Puducherry who, in turn, supplied it to local arrack sellers, sub-agents and brewers. This unravelled a clandestine operation and an illegal cottage industry which had access to chemicals for brewing and people at high places. A post-mortem of the sordid incident reveals that while this brew was freely available in villages, the recent price increase at the State government’s Tasmac outlets seems to have nudged villagers towards the relatively cheaper, but deadlier, moonshine.
Chengalpattu Collector transferred
Following the tragedy, Villupuram Superintendent of Police N. Shreenatha was placed under suspension. Seven other police officers were suspended in both districts for their alleged failure to prevent the deaths. Chengalpattu Collector A.R. Rahul Nadh and SP A. Pradeep were transferred.
An eerie silence engulfs Ekkiyarkuppam, a nondescript coastal hamlet near Marakkanam in Villupuram district abetting the Chennai-Puducherry East Coast Road. The streets are deserted. The silence is broken only by the occasional wails of mourners.
The entire village, the epicentre of the Marakkanam spurious liquor tragedy in which 12 people lost their lives, has plunged into sorrow. Two more died in the neighbouring Marakkanam Colony, taking the toll to 14 in Villupuram district.
The victims started arriving at hospitals in Puducherry and Villupuram on the night between Saturday and Sunday last and died one after another in one of the worst illicit liquor tragedies reported in the State in recent years.
Muthamizhselvi, 46, wife of Suresh, a fisherman and one of the victims at Ekkiyarkuppam, is inconsolable. She has lost the family’s breadwinner and has three children — daughter Soundarya, 25, and sons Rahul, 24, and Sanjay Kumar, 22. “My husband recently got hooked to spurious liquor despite our attempts to wean him off the habit. The brew was sold by a few on the outskirts of the village and my husband, along with others, would regularly drink it,” she says.
On Saturday, Suresh, along with a few other fishermen from Ekkiyarkuppam, went to Vambamedu and consumed the brew. “He returned home by noon, reeking of the brew, and fell down with a thud. Around 4 p.m., he started rolling on the floor with pain and complaining of blurred vision before vomiting. We rushed him to the Marakkanam government hospital from where doctors referred him to Villupuram. But there was no ambulance. We rushed him to the Pondicherry Institute of Medical Sciences (PIMS) near Kalapet in Puducherry, where he died on Saturday night,” says Muthamizhselvi.
Suresh’s family is not an exception. Of the 70 families affected by spurious liquor at Ekkiyarkuppam, at least 11 have lost their breadwinners.
Most of the deceased were fishermen who sought relief from their ‘exhaustion’ in spurious liquor after returning from the sea. The brew was being sold in the village for quite some time and the inhabitants slowly got addicted to it, since they found it to be a cheaper alternative to Tasmac liquor.
The demand had spurred an illegal network of bootleggers, arrack suppliers, sub-agents, and policemen that had operated at Ekkiyarkuppam with impunity, until last week. “Most of the fishermen earn a meagre ₹100 per day and cannot afford Tasmac liquor. This is cheaper at ₹40 per pottalam (sachet), and also provides an instant high. The supplies usually came from outside,” says M. Sivakumar, 65, a fisherman whose brother Vijayan, 55, is among the dead.
‘Kingpins not arrested’
Fisherwomen of Ekkiyarkuppam allege that the illegal spurious liquor business, operated by Amaran, had vitiated the atmosphere in the village. Despite repeated complaints to the police, no action was taken. “Hooch has completely destroyed the village. The police have only arrested the supplier and the sub-agents who procured the brew, but they have not arrested the kingpins who had a lot of clout. This indicates the police-arrack seller nexus in the village,” one woman laments.
R. Arumugam, 18, left home from Perumkaranai village on the morning last Saturday. His mother Vasantha, 42; brother-in-law Chinnathambi, 34; and sister Anjalai, 24, were showing signs of illness by the time he left their hut, but he had no idea how serious it would get.
The village is located nearly 95 kilometre away from Chennai in Chengalpattu district. The villagers call the residents in these huts as ‘Kattukaran’ (tribals) and no one had any clue to the tragedy about to befall their village.
Arumugam says, “We are all daily wagers and will do whatever jobs we get on any day. My mother, sister, and brother-in-law went to a neighbouring agriculture field to remove ‘Seemai Karuvelam’ [Prosopis juliflora].” They got ₹400 in wages and then they went to cut the grass at the field of D. Amavasai in the neighbouring Karikathangal village. As they finished their work, Amavasai told them that he had no money to pay the wages; instead, he offered arrack that he had at his house. He gave them the liquor in three plastic bottles, which the trio happily received, he explains.
Vasantha, Chinnathambi and Anjalai brought the liquor to the hut and together, they consumed it on Friday night, but did not eat anything. When Arumugam came back, he found all three in a terrible state, and with the help of the villagers, rushed them to a hospital. His mother and brother-in-law died, while his sister battles for her life.
Meanwhile, two more persons who were taken to the Chengalpattu government hospital died one after the other. A few yards away from the huts belonging to the tribals lived V. Mariyappan, 65, a small-time farmer. He died on Sunday at the hospital.
His wife Mariammal said that immediately after the death of Vasantha and Chinnathambi, police and other personnel reached every house looking for people who bought the brew from Amavasai.
“Immediately after the report from the hospital, we went to the villages and alerted the residents. We advised them to come with us to the hospital if they had any symptom of illness. All those who came forward were taken to the hospital, and that probably saved their lives,” said N. Kannan, Inspector-General of Police, North Zone.
K. Shankar, another resident of Perumkaranai, says the price of liquor is too expensive at Tasmac outlets. “We used to buy liquor from the local seller who operates a few yards away from the Tasmac outlet, which is located nearly three kilometres away from the village.”
In Marakkanam, the police have so far arrested Amaran, who supplied the brew, and eight others — Muthu, Arumugam, Ravi, Mannankatti and Gunaseelan of Marakkanam, Raja alias Barkathullah and Ezhumalai of Puducherry and Elayan Nambi of Thiruverkadu — in connection with the incident. Cases were booked against the accused under various sections, and murder charge was added subsequently.
Well entrenched in Marakkanam
Police sources confirmed that illicit liquor trade was well entrenched in the Marakkanam region and the authorities were well aware of those involved in toddy-tapping and smuggling of illicit liquor. The trade had developed with the connivance of a few policemen and persons with political backing. “The business in illicit liquor has been thriving in parallel with the business of Tasmac. Though arrests were made now and then, the kingpins in the illicit liquor trade have remained untouched,” the sources said.
“It is a well-known fact that panchayats auction rights to bootleggers to sell illicit liquor for a year. The auctions are held to prevent clashes between bootleggers, and a portion of the amount is used for the development of the panchayat,” a fishermen said.
In Chengalpattu, the police arrested Amavasai, 50, the landholder who routinely sold arrack illegally and supplied the liquor that caused the tragedy. Initially, though he was not critical, he admitted himself to hospital, saying he too had consumed the liquor. He is the brother of a DMK councillor. Amavasai had stored the hooch in a can, which he set on fire, as soon as he heard of the deaths.
Director-General of Police C. Sylendra Babu said Nambi, the chemical engineer, sold 1,200 litres of methanol in six barrels (200 litres each) to Raja alias Barkathullah and Ezhumalai of Puducherry for ₹66,000. He had procured it for his chemical firm Jayasakthi Private Ltd. at Vanagaram, Chennai, in 2018, but it remained unused because of the COVID-19 lock-down. Through Raja and Ezhumalai, liquor containing the methanol reached Marakkanam and Chithamur through ‘Vilambur’ Vijay, 45, a BJP functionary, suspected to be the go-between, the police said.
Altogether, the police arrested 17 persons and seized the remaining 1,192 litres in 48 hours.
The Chengalpattu district administration has since formed a special task force to prevent production and supply of spurious liquor. A total of eight teams, one each for eight taluks, have been formed. In addition to the formation of the special task force, revenue officials have asked the Village Administrative officers to inform the police of any illegal activities. Vincent, a resident of Pazhaveli and belonging to the Irular community, said the youngsters in the village planned to take up an awareness campaign among the elderly to prevent the consumption of illicit liquor.
(With inputs from S. Prasad in Villupuram; R. Sivaraman in Chengalpattu; and R. Srikanth in Chennai)
