After meeting the family members of those who died after consuming liquor in Pathariya Peer area, the Pradesh Congress Committee president Pritam Singh met the senior superintendent of police Arun Mohan Joshi on Sunday.
Submitting a memorandum to the SSP, the PCC president demanded that action be taken on a war footing against those illegally supplying intoxicants in the Pathariya Peer area and those protecting them.
He said that it is known to all that half a dozen people died and others were hospitalised after drinking spurious liquor. The business of illegal liquor and intoxicants has been thriving in this area for quite some time. He said that the Congress delegation had visited the affected area where the locals were complaining that despite such a big incident, the trade of illicit liquor and intoxicants is still continuing in the area.
Later, while talking to media persons, the PCC president blamed the State Government for the incident while alleging that some members of the party in power were also involved in the case. He said that a delegation of the Congress would visit the Raj Bhawan on Monday and meet the governor on this issue. He also demanded that the state government should announce Rs 10 lakh compensation each for the bereaved families of those who have died after consuming the spurious liquor.
Meanwhile, Mahanagar Congress workers staged a protest and burnt the state government in effigy.
The party’s Mahanagar chief Lalchand Sharma alleged that the BJP State government was encouraging the actions of the liquor mafia in the state. The state’s excise policy accords protection to the liquor mafia, encourages the smuggling of liquor and aims at supplying liquor to all homes in the State.
The involvement of BJP leaders and departmental officers in the Pathariya Peer incident is a proof of this, he averred. Sharma further alleged that illicit liquor trade has been thriving in Dehradun for some time due to BJP members working in connivance with departmental officers.