Chennai: The Satta Panchayat Iyakkam (SPI), which has been advocating total prohibition in the state, took a new route to advocate their cause. With the recent ban on consumer goods on grounds of contamination, the activists of the group took a similar path with liquor sending a bottle of brandy procured from a TASMAC store in T.Nagar for laboratory tests. The results showed that the bottle had more than permissible content of alcohol and also had sediments against standards.
“The sample given for testing contained 46 % of alcohol against the 42 % prescribed in the bottle and the test also confirms the presence of sedimentary particles which is a complete no-no against the norms set by Bureau of Indian Standards,” Senthil Arumugam, General Secretary, SPI said.The group also accused officials of the government-run laboratory King's Institute of refusing to test the alcohol sample. In an interaction caught on camera, the officer in charge, D.N. Jawaharlal refuses to run the tests on the ground that they are not authorised to and would do only if directed by the higher authorities.
“The government is serving sub standard liquor and the government run lab won’t run tests on it. Though, SPI’s stance is total prohibition, people have to know that the multi crore TASMAC business is run by serving substandard products to the consumer and further tests have to be done if it is harmful to the consumer,” Senthil Arumugam added.
