PROHIBITION
Healthy food and drinks bring a point a satisfaction. But intoxicants have a reverse effect. The more one drinks the more concentrated doses does he require. Indigenous wine sold under government contracts gives more satisfaction to the poor heavy drunkards who cannot otherwise afford the sophisticated rum or whisky. A festive occasion requires a still heavier dose.
Besides the deaths by spurious wine otherwise too the so called quality wines eat a man slowly but surely Drinking results in a number of incurable diseases pertaining to liver, kidney, stomach and lungs. Moreover, a drunkard is lore prone to sex. It has resulted in a large number of prostitution markets in e areas where drinking is rather a rule than an exception. AIDS, that killer disease is an accompaniment of sex in the modem world. The first six cases of e fatal disease were found in the brothels (prostitution market) of Chennai.
The hunger for sex among the drunkards has resulted in the development of flesh trade. Elopement of girls of different ages has become regular part of the immoral activities in the country. The incidence of apes under the effect of the evil drink has increased hundreds of times.
It is said first a man drinks wine. Then wine drinks the man. As linking is common among the poor it affects the whole family. Wine shares more than 60 per cent of their income. If it is a big family children and women starve. Even in a small family nothing is left to be spent on the education of the children. Illiteracy and mafiaism are just natural.
The social effect of drinking is very dangerous. It takes the whole society in its grip. In cities it is the poor homeless who are addict to this slow poison. Naturally it becomes a part of the slum culture. It is just an initial stage of intoxication. It leads to drug addiction. Brown sugar, an easily available drug throughout the country, is the second stage. Once a youngman uses it there is no way out. It ends with his life. Wine and drugs result in thefts; pick pocketing, smuggling, murders and suicides.
After independence the leaders of the period took great interest in prohibition. It started from Salem in Tamil Nadu with the efforts of C. Rajagopalachari and Porbandar, the birthplace of Mahatma Gandhi with the initiative of U.N. Dhebar a staunch disciple of the Mahatma. The enthusiasm diluted by the year 1958. U.P. took the lead in scrapping prohibition. Other states followed suit. Gujarat was the last to give way. But bootlegging continued everywhere even during the period of prohibition. Moreover some prominent economists argued that prohibition brings a great loss of revenue. In the eighties it was estimated to be more than 1000 crores. But the argument does not hold ground. It is at the cost of health and morality of crores of people. A larger amount is spent to counteract the effects of liquor. Let Tamil Nadu again take a lead as Salem did in the forties.