The demand for total prohibition in Tamil Nadu got intensified on Friday following the death of a prominent anti-liquor campaigner during a protest march for the closure of a liquor-outlet at Marthandam in Kanyakumari district, 700 km South of Chennai.
Sasi Perumal (79), a Sidha doctor from Salem and a popular anti-liquor campaigner in the State, had been demanding the closure of all watering holes in Tamil Nadu. The frail man dressed in Khadi and sporting a Gandhi cap had been on a fast unto death for the cause.
Friday saw him reach Marthandam to stage a protest in front of a watering hole that was openin defiance of a court order. Following the indifference of the authorities, Perumal climbed atop a 150-foot-tall mobile-phone tower to draw the attention of the authorities towards his demand, reminding one of Dharmendra’s histrionics in the 1975-movie Sholay. But the comedy in Sholay turned out to be a tragedy at Marthandam.
Though the officials who rushed to the location assured that they would do everything under their disposal to get the liquor outlet closed, the doctor refused to come down.
In a while he started swaying and seemed all set to fall down. The onlookers alerted the fire brigade, which rushed fire tenders to bring him down. Perumal was unconscious when he was brought down. The fire brigade staff rushed him to the nearest hospital where doctors announced him brought dead.
The reason for his death would be known only after a post-mortem, said one of the fire brigade officers at Kanyakumari. The frequent fasts undertaken by Perumal had taken a toll on his frail health. He had been arrested many times in the past and force-fed by police when he undertook fast unto death demanding total prohibition in Tamil Nadu.
Interestingly, the 2016 Assembly election is being fought on an anti-liquor demand. Anbumani Ramadoss, the chief ministerial candidate of the PMK, has declared that if elected he would make Tamil Nadu free of liquor menace by closing down all liquor outlets. Taking a cue from the PMK, mainline political parties like the DMK, the DMDK the Congress and the BJP too have declared their intentions to bring in prohibition in the State.
The DMK patriarch, M Karunanidhi (92), who was instrumental in getting prohibition lifted in 1967, too has declared that if returned to power in 2016, he would initiate steps to bring back prohibition. According to anti-liquor activists, the severe problem faced by Tamil Nadu is alcoholism which is rampant among the lower income group. The State gets revenue of Rs 28,000 crore on an average every year from liquor trade.