The third phase of Kerala’s gradual transition into a totally booze-free State started on Sunday with all liquor joints — including bars, retail outlets and even toddy shops remaining closed as part of the new liquor policy of the Congress-led UDF Government by which Sundays would remain “dry” from now. With this, the number of dry days in Kerala would increase threefold.
This is sure to hit the general tendency of a large section of Keralites to sip a peg or two with friends or relatives before lunch and the regular boozers’ habit of drowning the weekly holiday in alcohol. Even the elite who want to unwind their tensed minds with spirit may not have that chance from now on as even bars at five-star hotels and rich men’s clubs will remain closed.
“In short, Sundays in Kerala have lost their sunny side,” said N Kutty, a top official of a new-generation bank who used to withdraw to the insides of a top-notch hotel in Kochi to spend Sunday evenings “with a little bit of booze and a lot of friends”. “For me this is not just a question of those pegs but it is a question of my culture and life-style,” he added.
Kuttappan Pillai, a rice farmer from Kuttanad, Alappuzha is unable to understand the logic of converting Sundays into dry days for toddy shops also. “If this is part of the liquor ban programme, it has no logic as far as toddy shops are concerned because the Government does not intend to ban toddy. Why do they want to deny some peace of mind to people like meIJ” he asks.
Retail liquor outlets across the State had witnessed brisk sales on Saturday as customers, being aware that Sunday was to be a dry day, thronged them in large numbers in order to keep a bottle or two for use on Sunday. In some places, the crowds were so large that the police had to use limited force to control them.
With Sundays going dry now, the total number of no-booze days in a year in the State would go up to 78. So far, Kerala had only 26 dry days including the first day of every month and the special no-liquor holidays like Gandhi Jayanti. The first week of every month will now have two dry days.
The declaration of Sundays as dry days had faced stiff opposition from the Cabinet itself. Pooh-poohing the Government’s idea, labour Minister Shibu Baby John, who believed that the liquor ban programme would spell disaster for the State’s tourism and IT sectors, said, “What the Government is telling the people is that they may now take leave if they want to drink.”
The Government of Chief Minister Oommen Chandy is intending to implement total liquor ban in ten years through phases. In the first phase, it wants all the bars - except those functioning at the 20 five-star hotels - in the State to be closed. As many as 418 bars have already been closed down. The fate of the remaining 292 is to be decided by the High Court.
In the second phase of the programme, the Government wants to close down ten percent of the existing retail liquor outlets every year leading to total eradication of liquor within ten years. This phase started on October 2 with the closure of 39 of the total 384 retail liquor outlets, all of which are run by two Government agencies.
The third phase of the liquor ban programme, making Sundays dry days started on October 5, amidst protests from the owners of the 292 bars who said they need not abide by the new liquor policy as the Supreme Court had allowed them to continue status quo till the High Court settled the case finally.
However, the bar owners revised their position late Saturday night and agreed to keep their establishments closed on Sunday after talks with Excise Minister K Babu, who insisted that they abide by the new policy. As a result, Kerala had three dry days in the first five days of October: The first day of the month, Gandhi Jayanti and Sunday.