Chennai: “Build us an Ullasa Nagaram (paradise city) and you will not find any tippler getting involved in road accidents. The city will be exclusively for us, tipplers. There will not be any road traffic and so, no accidents. Simple”. That's P. Chellapandian, president, Tamil Nadu Madhukudippor Vizhipunarvu Sangam (TN tipplers awareness association), reacting to the Supreme Court ordering closure of tasmac liquor shops within 500 metres of national and state highways because of the increasing road casualties caused by liquor consumption.
In other words, Pandian's logic would run thus-why not close the roads near the liquor shops instead of the other way round? “This Supreme Court order will not affect us much. We are not using any highway (tasmac) shop anyway”, he said, adding, “If the government closes these shops now, the tipplers will pick their bottles from another shop a short distance away”.
Pandian's sangam is seven years old and has over 3000 members across Tamil Nadu. “Our main agenda is to ensure happy drinking, uninterrupted. At the same time, we are fighting for government insurance for our members and compensation for their families should anything tragic happens”, says Pandian, who had undertaken a bike rally from Chennai to Kanyakumari sometime back “to create public awareness about the sangam's demands”.
“The government must listen to us and meet our demands because we contribute one-fifth of the annual state budget. The annual tasmac sales amount to Rs 26,000 crore whereas the annual state budget is about Rs 1.25 lakh crore. We play a major role in fuelling the state economy”, said Pandian.
