NEW DELHI, Dec 20: A police official was mowed down and killed and a constable seriously injured allegedly by liquor mafias on the intervening nights of Tuesday and Wednesday in Begusarai district in Bihar.
Police officials said the deceased Khamas Choudhary, a sub-inspector, was leading a team from the Nawakothi police station in response to a tip-off on liquor smuggling. “The police team was waiting for the liquor smugglers near the Chhatauna Budhi Gandak river bridge at around midnight on Wednesday.
Seeing the policemen, the smugglers increased speed of their vehicle which mowed down the police official Khamas Choudhary and a home guard constable. The police official died later while the constable Baleshwar Yadav was admitted in local government hospital with serious injuries,” Begusarai Superintendent of Police Yogendra Kumar said. The police, later, arrested the driver of the vehicle and conducted raids to arrest others involved.
Attack on officers by liquor mafias are becoming common in the State. On May 26, 2022, an assistant sub-inspector of police was also crushed to death allegedly by liquor mafias in Siwan district. According to a police officials, at least a dozen incidents on attack on policemen by liquor mafias have been reported from different districts in recent months.
Meanwhile, the Opposition BJP leader and Union Minister Giriraj Singh, who represents Begusarai constituency in Parliament, slammed the Nitish Kumar-led government in Bihar and held his “liquor ban” responsible for the incident.
Bihar was declared a dry State in April 2016 under the new Prohibition and Excise (Amendment) Act’ 2016. Sale, purchase and manufacture of liquor was banned under provisions of new liquor laws. Over 1.6 crore litre of illegal Indian Made Foreign Liquor (IMFL) and 97 lakh litres of desi (country-made) liquor have been seized so far in the State and as many as 250 people have died after consuming illicit liquor in the State.
“It was due to wrong policies of liquor ban and due to stubbornness of Chief Minister of Bihar Nitish Kumar, several innocent people had to go to jail, died and police officials are crushed to death. Who is responsible for these deaths Nitish Kumar ji?” Mr Singh said while requesting the chief minister to “review” his decision of liquor ban by calling an all-party meeting. Mr Kumar, though, have often been iterating that as long as he was in power, the liquor ban would not be lifted in the State.
(Manas Dasgupta)