CHENNAI: Want to make `10 crore? Try proving that liquor sold through TASMAC outlets is any way healthier than toddy, and you could bag the prize, says Tamil Nadu Toddy Movement coordinator C Nallasamy. “It is not banned in any State except Tamil Nadu,” he says.
The movement has been trying to spread awareness about the drink through out-of-the-ordinary protests. They also held an ‘Aswamedha yagam’ (horse ritual) where a man representing a horse traversed 5 km.
Anyone who stopped the horse would have to prove that toddy was harmful for health. “No one stopped us,” he says. Speaking of the benefits to farmers, he says that though toddy tapped from coconut trees could not be of a high standard due to usage of pesticides and so on, what is tapped from palmyra would be clean, as the trees thrive naturally without help of ice boxes and polythene bags.