Hyderabad, July 07: Lok Satta Party president Jayaprakash Narayan today appealed to all political parties — whom he described as saara parties — and civil society organizations to join hands and save the state from the scourge of liquor.
Successive governments have already succeeded in ruining the health and financial security of 75 lakh families or nearly 3.5 crore people. The excise year which began on July 1, 2010 threatens to unveil a still darker chapter in the state’s history, he warned, quoting facts and figures.
Narayan spoke while flagging off his party’s 16-day campaign in as many districts (barring those where Assembly byelections are due) against the menace of liquor. “This is not an issue concerning this party or that party or a problem that can be resolved overnight. It concerns the future of the people. The struggle is going to be long and arduous and warrants supreme sacrifice,’’ he said.
The state government will earn up to Rs 18,000 crore as revenue during the new excise year against Rs 13,000 crore in the previous year by way of license fees, excise, sales tax/VAT, and privilege fee. According to a conservative estimate, liquor shop licensees who together incur an expenditure of Rs 10 crore per day on license fee alone, have to sell liquor worth Rs 80 crore per day to stay afloat. In other words, people will be spending more than Rs 30,000 crore on liquor consumption in the current excise year, without taking into account their spends on illicit arrack, ‘gudumba’ and adulterated toddy.
Narayan regretted that traditional political parties have become ‘saara’ parties in that they encourage liquor consumption by young through free distribution of it during elections. If the traditional parties were sincere, they should pledge themselves against free liquor distribution.
Lok Satta general secretary Katari Srinivasa Rao said the campaign would start from Dubagunta village in Nellore district where women electrified the state in the 1990s by launching a movement against liquor.
Closure of belt hops and liquor shop ante rooms and rallies by families ruined by liquor will form part of the campaign.
N Saroja Devi, president of Mahila Satta, pointed out that there are hundreds of villages without safe drinking water but not a single habitation without a liquor outlet in Andhra Pradesh.
–Agencies