Illicit liquor kills dozens in India, several survivors lose eyesight

At least 31 people have died and 20 others have been hospitalised in serious condition after allegedly drinking tainted liquor sold without authorisation in an eastern state in India.

Police officer Santosh Kumar said several of the 20 hospitalised have lost their eyesight.

The deaths occurred on Tuesday and Wednesday. The victims belonged to three villages in Bihar state where the manufacturing, sale and consumption of liquor are prohibited. 

Such bans are in force in several Indian states, driving a thriving black market for cheap alcohol made in unregulated backstreet distilleries that kill hundreds of people yearly.

The sale and consumption of liquor were prohibited in Bihar state in 2016 after women’s groups campaigned against poor workers splurging their meagre incomes on drinking.

The deaths were reported in a government-run hospital where their families brought the sick for treatment.

Several opposition parties, including the Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party, held protests on Thursday outside the state legislature building to demand the state’s liquor ban be scrapped and some monetary compensation provided to the bereaved families.

Opposition party leader of BJP, Sushil Modi, said more than 1,000 people have died after drinking tainted liquor since the ban was imposed six years ago. 

Nitish Kumar, the state’s top elected official belonging to the socialist party Janata Dal, rejected their demands and said the ban on the sale of liquor was “not my personal wish but a response to the cries of the women of the state”. 

Three people have been detained for questioning for allegedly selling spiked alcohol in the area, he said.

Consumption of cheap liquor common 

Deaths from illegally brewed alcohol are common in India, where illicit liquor is cheap and often spiked with chemicals such as pesticides to increase potency. 

Illicit liquor has also become a hugely profitable industry across India, where bootleggers pay no taxes and sell enormous quantities of their product to the poor at a cheap rate.

At least 28 people died and 60 others became ill from drinking tainted liquor in the western Indian state of Gujarat earlier this year.

Gujarat is another Indian state where the manufacturing, sale and consumption of liquor are prohibited. 

In 2020, at least 120 people died after drinking tainted liquor in India’s northern Punjab state.

READ MORE: Many die in India after drinking toxic illegal alcohol