Patna: Vijay Kumar Sinha, the Leader of Opposition in the Bihar Assembly, has demanded blood tests of every legislator in the state to find out who consumes liquor.
Sinha’s demand comes as the Nitish Kumar government has refused to give compensation to family members of those who died in the Saran hooch tragedy.
“We demand from the state government to conduct blood tests of every legislator at the gate of Vidhan Sabha. It will give an idea about how many leaders who are surrounding Nitish Kumar used to drink liquor,” the opposition leader said.
“After the Saran hooch tragedy, the ugly face of the Nitish Kumar government appeared before the people of Bihar. As per the provision, the state government has to give compensation to the family members of the deceased. Instead of doing this, the current grand alliance government is not even expressing condolences.”
Sinha went on to say that the state government had provided compensation during the 2016 Khajoorbanni liquor tragedy in Gopalganj.
“On that occasion, the government had given Rs 400,000 cash as compensation. If it gave compensation then, why not now?” he queried.
Sinha also claimed that compensations were being given out for victims of bike accidents, whether bikers wear helmets or not.
“In Saran, what is the fault of family members of the deceased? All the deceased are poor, Dalit and daily earners. If the Nitish Kumar government becomes insensitive, how could they survive?”
He also alleged that the death toll in the Saran tragedy is much higher that the figure released by the state government.
“The local authority has put pressure on the family members and cremated the bodies without a post-mortem.”
The tragedy occurred on December 12 and 57 people have died after consuming the spurious liquor so far.
Police officers dismissed
Bihar Police on Monday said 206 police officials allegedly involved in illegal activities related to prohibition were dismissed in 2022.
“We are continuously taking action against the police officials involved in illegal activities. In 2020, we have dismissed 201 police officials, 172 police officials in 2021 and 206 police officials in 2022 till November,” Bihar Director General of Police SK Singhal told reporters here.
Asked about Chhapra tragedy, the DGP said, “The investigation is going on and action is being taken against those who are found guilty.”
Earlier on Monday, Bihar Police conducted a raid at an illegal liquor manufacturing unit operating in an open field near Danapur railway station in Patna. Police team found plastic containers buried inside the ground, in which the Mahua and chemicals were kept.
“We found ‘Mahua’ here. It is illegal. No person has been arrested from here yet,” ASI Anil Kumar Singh told ANI.
In the aftermath of the Bihar hooch tragedy, state Excise Minister Sunil Kumar on Monday said that raids are being conducted at various places to nab all the accused.
He added that further action in the hooch tragedy would be taken only after the post-mortem report.
