Liquor shops ban: Govt urged to implement SC order by March 31

A joint meeting of various social organisations and Tamil outifts held here today called upon the territorial government to ensure that the Supreme Court order to close down all liquor shops along state and national highways across the country, was implemented in letter and spirit.
Secretary of the Federation of People's Rights G Sugumaran, who chaired the meeting, in a release later said that a resolution was adopted unanimously at the meeting exhorting the Puducherry government to ensure that the liquor shops on the highways here were closed by March 31 this year, which is the deadline set by the Apex court.

Sugumaran also noted that the closure of the shops would be of help to save precious human lives as road accidents had been on the rise and majority of them were attributed to drunk driving.
The shops on the highways should be wound up and the Puducherry government should not be lax in implementing the court order, he said.
In case there was a delay in implementation, political parties and Tamil outfits would launch a massive agitation in the near future, he added.
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Meanwhile, a police team has seized both country made
and foreign liquor worth Rs 15 lakh from near a restaurant located on GT road under Dehri-On-Sone police station area of Bihar's Rohtas district late last night.

Sub-Divisional Police Officer (SDPO) Mohammad Anwar Javed Ansari today said the said stock of liquor was seized from a pick-up van which was had come from Jharkhand's Palamu district.
Jitendra Mehta, the driver of the van, has been arrested and sent to jail, the SDPO said, adding that police have seized 10,000 pouches of country made liquor and 734 bottles of different foreign liquor from the van.