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Kamal Anand January 5 at 9:36am
Chandigarh on a high
Per capita consumption 136 bottles
Pradeep Sharma
Tribune News Service
Chandigarh, January 3
Blame
it on the Chandigarh administration’s lopsided excise policy or the
people’s changing lifestyle, the city is slowing turning into a Bacchus
lovers’ paradise. The per capita consumption is around 136 bottles, a
development which is set to ring alarms bells among a cross-section of
society.
The figures are all the more alarming in the backdrop
of the fact that the Excise Act prescribes 25 as the minimum age for
drinking liquor.
With over 2 lakh bottles of liquor being sold
in the city every day, the problem seems to have assumed alarming
proportions, with smuggling not being ruled out.
And
surprisingly, there are less than 20 cases registered in Punjab,
Haryana, Chandigarh, Himachal Pradesh and Delhi in the past 10 years
for underage drinking.
“The liberalised policy on alcohol sale
by bureaucrats of Chandigarh is responsible for the problem and it is
time for the administration to take note of the huge figure,” says
public health activist Hemant Goswami.
In fact, information
obtained under an RTI query by the NGO People for Transparency for its
campaign ‘Stop! Underage Drinking’ presents an alarming picture of
liquor consumption in the region.
Sturdy Haryanvis seems to have
overtaken boisterous Punjabis, famous for their Patiala peg, as far
alcohol consumption is concerned.
During 2008-09, 1.2 crore
Haryanvis gulped 26.52 crore bottles of alcohol. Delhi with a
population of 1.10 crore adults was far behind Haryana with 16.28 crore
bottles of alcohol.
Even the hilly picturesque state of Himachal Pradesh managed to beat Punjab
with regard to per capita alcohol consumption.
According
to information provided by excise departments of the five states, the
4.5 crore adults consumed 74.46 crore bottles of alcohol during the
year 2008-09.
“This is certainly very good news for the alcohol
industry, but not for the health authorities,” said RTI activist Kamal
Anand, who had compiled the information.
According to the World
Health Organisation’s global status report on alcohol 2004, the total
recorded per capita alcohol consumption among the age groups above 15
years of age was 0.82 litre of pure alcohol, but it was 12.44 litres of
alcohol in the five states.
Poor lead the binge: ‘Desi’ accounts for 70 per cent of liquor sales in state
Sanjeev Chopra Tags : congress, accounts, liquor sale Posted: Wednesday, Dec
23, 2009 at 0339 hrs Patiala:
Days
after all the fresh applicants to the Punjab Congress submitted an
extraordinary declaration in their membership forms that none of them
consumes alcohol, the state, infamous for alarming levels of drug
addiction among youths, is now homing in to the Bacchus as well. And,
it is the poor who are consuming it more than the rich in the state.
Fresh
data from the Punjab Excise and Taxation department reveals a
significant rise in the intoxication levels among the Punjab residents,
with adults gulping close to 12 bottles of liquor a year. Country
liquor, with enormous adulteration and damaging effects to health,
makes up a whopping 70 per cent of total liquor sales in Punjab.
With
the average increase of liquor consumption per adult in the state
rising by 16.13 per cent in 2008-09 from the last fiscal, an adult
(including women) above the age of 18 is drinking as much as 11.45
bottles of liquor. If adult women, who are generally considered not to
drink, are excluded the consumption of alcohol for every adult man in
the state comes to a whopping 22.04 bottles during 2008-09. In 2007-08,
every adult (including women) consumed 9.86 bottles a year, whereas the
adult male population had an intake of 19.02 bottles of liquor a year.
These
facts were revealed by the data provided by the Punjab Excise and
Taxation department on an RTI application filed by a Sangrur resident
Kamal Anand. The reply also revealed that the state sold 3.86 crore
bottles of beer, with every male adult drinking an average of 4.42
bottles a year.
Of the total sale of 19.26 crore bottles of
liquor, the sale of country liquor is nearly 70 per cent at 13.48 lakh
bottles, indicating that the intake of liquor among the poor in the
state is more as the country liquor is generally consumed by them, said
Anand.
The data excluded the liquor consumed in the state
through illicit distilling and smuggled alcohol from neighbouring
states, where it costs much less.
The state Excise department
collected a revenue of Rs 1,810.72 crore in 2008-09 from the sale of
liquor, up from Rs 1,570.30 crore collected in 2005-06 and Rs 1,363.67
crore in 2006-07 and Rs 1,860.99 crore in 2007-08. The state has 2,096
liquor vends of Indian-made foreign liquor and 4,818 vends of Punjab
medium liquor, besides 263 bars and 29 departmental stores selling
liquor. Besides, the liquor is also sold in hotels and restaurants in
Punjab, the data of which is not available with the department.
http://www.indianexpress.com/news/poor-lead-the-binge-desi-accounts-for-70-per-cent-of-liquor-sales-in-state/558109/0
http://www.asianage.com/presentation/leftnavigation/news/india/liquor-intake-in-n-india-high.aspx
Poor lead the binge: ‘Desi’ accounts for 70 per cent of liquor sales in state
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Poor lead the binge: ‘Desi’ accounts for 70 per cent of liquor sales in
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‘Desi’ accounts for 70 per cent of liquor sales in state
