CHENNAI: The Madras High Court has ordered a CBI probe into the Kallakurichi hooch that snuffed out the lives of 68 persons, mostly from the downtrodden section of the society.
A division bench of Justices D Krishnakumar and PB Balaji passed the orders on Wednesday on a batch of public interest litigations seeking a CBI probe into the hooch tragedy that rocked the state recently.
The petitions were filed by AIADMK legal wing secretary IS Inbadurai, leader of Lawyers Forum for Social Justice K Balu, BJP’s A Mohandass, former DMDK MLA B Parthasarathy and former MLA Dr A Sridharan.
The bench directed the CB-CID of the state police to hand over the case files to CBI within two weeks and ordered the latter to hold the probe in an expeditious manner.
“The CBI is directed to investigate all the aspects of the three cases (relating to hooch tragedy) and file the final report before jurisdictional court as early as possible,” the bench said in the order.
Justice Balaji, in a separate order, said the Kallakurichi hooch tragedy is a classic example of the proverb “kudi kudiyai kedukkum” meaning that consumption of alcohol destroys the whole community.
He slammed the state for reinstating a top police officer of the district, who was suspended immediately after the tragedy, without proper reasons.
The state was not able to demonstrate what disciplinary action has been taken against these errant officials, he said.
“All these leads us to believe there was an unholy connection between the manufacturers of the illicit liquor and the police officials. It also bewilders us that the prime accused Kannukutty alias Govindaraj, despite several cases booked, admittedly goes on scot-free selling the illicit arrack,” the judge remarked.
Justice Balaji charged the police of ‘turning a blind eye’ to the illicit liquor spree.
Criticising the CB-CID of being ‘misdirected’ in probing the links of two persons from Puducherry, the judge noted that the CBI will be well-equipped to probe the inter-state angle of the tragedy.
He said the Kallakurichi incident shall serve as a ‘wake-up’ call to society to save the future generations from the ill effects of alcohol and liquor.