Kerala’s Catholic Church, which has been a staunch supporter of the Congress traditionally, on Friday launched an agitation against the Congress-led UDF Government protesting against its act of watering down its own liquor policy.
The Malabar zonal unit of the Madya Viruddha Samithi (anti-liquor council) of the Kerala Catholic Bishops’ Council (KCBC), the umbrella body of all the 31 Catholic dioceses in the State, held a ‘standing’ stir at Kozhikode on Friday demanding restoration of the liquor policy the Government had announced on August 22 envisaging total liquor ban in ten years.
The agitation was launched just three days after Samithi’s top office-bearers warned the UDF saying that none of the people’s representatives who had supported the changes in the liquor policy would win elections in the future. The stir had the blessings of the Kozhikode and Thamarassery dioceses of the Catholic Church, agitators said.
The Samithi had earlier decided to start its stir on January 1, but it was advanced in the context of the sharp criticisms unleashed against the KCBC by Cultural Affairs Minister KC Joseph of the Congress who alleged that Christians were the biggest consumers of alcohol in the State and that the KCBC should “look in the mirror” to realise this.
The agitators at Kozhikode, who included nuns, Congressmen and other faithful, wanted Joseph, a loyalist of Chief Minister Oommen Chandy, to withdraw his statement. Chandy himself had on Wednesday attacked the KCBC, saying that it had not opposed the opening of hundreds of retail liquor outlets following the ban on arrack in 1996.
The Samithi alleged that the Government’s decision to permit the 418 bars closed on March 31for lack of required facilities to run beer and wine parlours was equivalent to attracting even adolescents to the world of booze. “This change in policy will destroy families and individuals. We can’t allow that,” said Fr Danny Joseph, chief organiser of Friday’s stir.
Samithi sources said that the Friday event at Kozhikode was just a token agitation but intense agitations would be held across the State if the Government was not prepared to do a rethinking on the changes it had made to the policy. They have already stated that a ‘standing’ stir would be held at Kochi on January 1.
The KCBC, which had praised the original liquor policy of the Government, turned against it after it revoked the earlier decision that made Sundays no-booze days and decided to allot beer-and-wine parlour licences to the 418 bars, effectively upsetting its own policy. But Chandy defended the changes saying the Government had done this considering ‘practicality’.
At the same time, indications came out on Friday that the standoff between the KCBC and the Government might not end soon with Joseph renewing its attack against the Church despite its protests against his previous statement. He said on Friday that there could have been some ulterior motives behind the Samithi’s agitation against the Government.
“Everybody has the right to protest. But a panel of the KCBC shouldn’t be doing this. Instead, it should be holding awareness campaigns to make the people withdraw from the habit of boozing,” Joseph said, adding that the Government would not revoke the decisions it had taken on the liquor policy under any circumstance.
Meanwhile, the Nair Service Society (NSS), outfit of Hindu upper caste Nairs, on Friday aired support for the changed liquor policy. NSS general secretary G Sukumaran Nair said that his organisation had been stressing on the point of practicality in the liquor policy and that the Government had arrived at this practicality now.