Nitish Kumar asks 40 lakh plus JD-U workers to propagate prohibition

He also appealed to party workers to counter the falsehood by vociferously speaking in favour of alcohol ban

Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar on Monday roped in more than 40 lakh JD(U) workers to counter "falsehood" spread against prohibition by some "affected intellectuals deprived of quota of 1-2 peg."

"A few intellectuals deprived of their quota of 1-2 peg are spreading falsehood regarding liquor ban in Bihar," Kumar said at the one-day JD(U) state council meeting.

Kumar appealed to party workers to counter the falsehood by vociferously speaking in favour of alcohol ban.

"In democracy power of speaking matters a lot...Move your lips more strongly in favour of prohibition and other programmes of "sushashan" which should become voice of the nation," the CM said.

Kumar, who is National President of JD(U) asked state party leadership to take out "prabhat pheri" and hold "sankalp sabha" on Gandhi Jayanti to promote "jan chetna" (peoples awareness) in favour of prohibition and "seven resolves".

He also called for organising shivir (camp) and orientation programmes for more than 1.5 lakh active JD(U) workers for the same.

Newly re-elected Bihar JD(U) President Basisthan Narayan Singh promptly responded to CM's call and announced the programmes for workers on October 2.

Besides Singh, senior party leader Sharad Yadav and a host of state ministers, Members of Parliament, State Legislature and senior party office bearers were in attendance.

In the beginning of his speech, Kumar pointed to some media reports which claimed that there were negligible takers of CM's offer of providing Sudha dairy outlets in place of closed liquor shops to protect livelihood of those employed there and said, "If they did not come to grab the offer what is my fault?"

"If anybody is really interested to make a reality check of prohibition visit any village in the state and see how happy the women and family are feeling," he said highlighting merits of April 5 decision to declare Bihar a dry state.

Kumar has been facing criticism from opposition and also sections of civil society dubbing it as "talibani and draconian" in some media reports and discussions on TV channels on making liquor law more stringent by incorporating provisions of arrest of all adult members of a family in case of recovery of liquor from a home and community penalty against habitual violators of prohibition.

Amended Liquor law will be notified from October 2, he said.