Chandigarh: After Delhi, the other Aam Aadmi Party (AAP)-ruled state, Punjab, is also in the thick of a controversy linked to liquor.
Since Wednesday (March 20) as many as 20 people aged between 25 and 70 have died due to the suspected consumption of spurious liquor, also known as hooch, in Punjab’s Sangrur district.
Speaking to The Wire, Sangrur’s civil surgeon Kirpal Singh confirmed the death toll and informed that another 16 patients are under observation, of which one person is in critical condition.
This is the worst hooch tragedy in Punjab since 2020, when over 100 people were killed due to consuming similar poisonous liquor.
Then in the opposition, the AAP had repeatedly claimed it would eradicate the hooch mafia if given a chance to rule the state.
Ironically, two years after it formed the government in Punjab, a hooch tragedy has occurred in AAP chief minister Bhagwant Mann’s own home district.
Gujjran village in Sangrur’s Dirba constituency, which has been one of the hotspots of spurious liquor deaths this week, is represented by another senior AAP leader, the state’s finance minister Harpal Singh Cheema.
While Mann is silent on the issue so far, the Punjab police initially claimed to have busted a spurious liquor manufacturing gang by arresting four persons.
As the toll has increased in the last two days, the state government finally announced a four-member special investigation team (SIT) led by an additional director general of police-rank officer to probe the case.
But the opposition is already up against the AAP, using the latest incident to build up a narrative against the government ahead of the Lok Sabha polls. Punjab will vote in the elections’ seventh phase on June 1.
The arrest of AAP national convener and Delhi chief minister Arvind Kejriwal came as a double whammy for the party.
Shiromani Akali Dal (SAD) president Sukhbir Singh Badal said in a statement that the Sangrur hooch tragedy was indicative of the state of affairs in Punjab as well as those in chief minister Bhagwant Mann’s home district of Sangrur.
Demanding a judicial probe into the tragedy, Badal said that “this is what happens when governance takes a fall and you allow your legislators to collude with illegal liquor and drug traffickers.”
He added: “I have been stating repeatedly that AAP legislators are sheltering drug traffickers and even taking monthlies from them. The latest hooch tragedy reveals how deep the rot has set in.”
The Congress leadership in Punjab is equally critical of the hooch tragedy, even as the party has been in alliance with the AAP in Delhi, Haryana, Goa, Gujarat and Chandigarh. Both parties, however, have kept Punjab out of their alliance for strategic reasons.
On Friday, Punjab’s Congress chief Amrinder Singh Raja Warring visited Sangrur and said that several beavered family members had personally informed him that one death had occurred due to the unavailability of an ambulance.
He asked the Mann government to act strongly lest casualties go up.
In the case of Kejriwal’s arrest, too, the Congress is not speaking in one voice. While the top Congress leadership rallied behind the AAP after Kejriwal arrest, many in Punjab hit out at the AAP and reminded it of similar cases the Mann government filed against them allegedly out of vendetta.
Ground situation tense
The hooch tragedy deaths were first reported from Gujjran village.
Initially, local authorities thought that the impact of the tragedy was limited. But deaths began occurring from other areas too, showing the widespread distribution of spurious liquor in the district.
After Gujran village, the Sunam block of Sangrur district emerged as the worst affected as all the latest deaths were reported from the block’s Tibbi Ravidaspura and Dhandoli Khurd villages.
Local authorities told The Wire that most victims were poor, surviving on daily wage income and menial jobs.
Both the young as well as the old fell into the trap of this tragedy as the list of deceased shows.
For instance, Kuldeep Singh (25), Jagjit Singh (27), Laddi (27), Gursewak (30), Gyan Singh (32) and Lacha Singh (35) are among the deceased so far.
The tragedy has taken away the lone bread-winners of several poor families. State health authorities have been doing door-to-door surveys in affected areas to rule out any more victims.
Harmesh Singh, son of deceased Budh Singh from Tibbi Ravidaspur village, told The Wire that his father had come home Thursday night after a day’s work and went to sleep. He was unconscious the next day and was declared dead upon reaching a hospital.
He said this tragedy had destroyed a lot of families. The government must come forward by announcing some financial assistance and make sure that those behind the incidents are arrested soon, he added.
