Presented by Kuolachalie Seyie during ABCCTK Seminar
The hated alcohol’s notorious track record as a powerful chemical, if misused – to seduce, enslave and destroy its users and ultimately destroy our families and societies as well, is overwhelmingly fearful. Advanced and developed societies with more experience of embracing positive changes and resources available do manage to handle the issue with less controversy. But for our young Naga society wrestling with the intricate challenges of growth, the task is far greater and difficult to deal with.
The ancient wine of Jesus Christ’s time composed of only 6% alcohol, according to the renowned Bible scholar William Barclay, whereas today’s alcoholic drinks are totally different- beer has a composition of 18% alcohol, brandy, vodka, rum and whisky contain up to 58% alcohol, apart from its dangerous adulterants.
Churches of Nagaland headed by NBCC stood up courageously against this menace of rampant sale of alcohol in 1989 and continued its protest until the NLTP Act 1989 was passed by the Nagaland Legislative Assembly. The State Govt. under the pressure of churches hurriedly and haphazardly passed the NLTP Act without commitment and sincerity, thereby leaving major “legal loopholes” in the crisis, then and now and is entirely responsible for it. Therefore, immediate rectification is needed. If we can acknowledge the loopholes, we will resolve our common crisis practically with more understanding and less recrimination.
Some public leaders or VIPs are more interested in liquor shop license rather than solving the problem of liquor in our Naga society.In some of our Naga traditional festivals organized by some of our powerful political leaders, the younger generation, including minor children are blatantly encouraged to drink.
Today alcohol is often served openly at the residences of many high officials; while some church leaders defending alcoholism in the occasional NLTP Act debates and alcohol related meetings, certainly adds to the prevailing problem of alcoholism in our State. If you want anything for yourself selfishly –whoever you may be, whatever you do or say, increases our “Naga problem”. Under such circumstances, the State Govt. has neither rectified the legal loopholes nor implemented the salient features of NLTP Act such as prohibition council, prohibition committees or set up restricted liquor stores, till date since its enactment. Others who supported the lifting of the Act call it a failure, even before it is implemented or attempted to be implemented.
The constant claim of the Govt. losing crores of rupees in revenue due to Prohibition Act has gone on since the enactment of the Act. The Govt. has inherited the heavy burden of a thoughtlessly enacted NLTP Act on a crucial issue on one hand and the financial chaos due to rampant corruption on the other. The burden has been getting heavier over the years. The perception of the public in general is that it now wants to be rid of the hated burden without performing its bounden responsibilities as the representatives of its people.
The economy or the quality of governance will not improve in any case by shedding the burden with the help of groups of people with vested interest in controlling the flow of alcohol into Nagaland. This further raises the question of when will the searchlight be thrown by the Govt. on the enormous amount of money embezzled in the various Govt. Departments by our politicians, bureaucrats, contractors and suppliers inside Nagaland and outside that should have gone to developing Nagaland for everyone?
The many crores said to be lost in revenues recoverable from alcohol if prohibition is lifted, get all the attention in the present Naga society. But, the funds stolen by many, to satisfy their greed would exceed by much greater amount than that of the expected sales tax recoverable from alcohol. These are part of the controversy related to alcohol’s impact on our society. It is not surprising that the raising of moral and spiritual issues by the Church is categorized as pharisaic, dogmatic, archaic or worse and more by its critics.
With regards to the revenue burden, it is understandable that we cannot afford to continue with the present financial status of being parasites to New Delhi without producing any of our own, but it is not an excuse for the free flow of alcohol into Nagaland: instead, we should concentrate on businesses and industries with hard work, integrity, commitment and engineering for consistent quality production to be self-sufficient.
The collapse of Sugar Mill, Dimapur, Paper Mill, Tuli, Mini Cement Plant, Wazeho and Semi Mechanised Brick Plant, Chümukedima due to corruption in spite of having its high potential should not discourage us, but rather it should be used as a stepping stone and lesson. The success story of Dimul, Dimapur and the exports of Tapioca products from Mokokchung and the likes are inspiring examples, though small in size, needs encouragement.
Legal loopholes must be rectified at all cost. In 1989, a few days before NLTP Act was enacted by the NLA, one of the most powerful ministers then who was also a lawyer said with derisive laughter that they were burdened with all of the Naga problems, and the Church leaders were very selfish that instead of praying for them, they would fast unto death, after all they would go to heaven after death. Mocking the Church or Bible is not a new thing yesterday or today; however, the believers ever move forward stronger instead.
Under these circumstances the Act was enacted without any commitment from the Govt, so the Act was left till date with some major legal loopholes, such an example to be mentioned here is that there is no different degree of punishment between the illegal import or export of only one bottle of alcohol or for a full truck load or more. The defined commercial quantity as laid dawn under the NDPS Act is not applicable in this Prohibition Act. The bootleggers know these legal lacunas and get away, scot free even when they are arrested with huge quantities of illegal liquor. Even seizure of a large commercial quantity of illegal liquor is bail able and it becomes a matter of right for the bootleggers.
There are certain wide scopes of exemptions for medical reasons, categorised foreigners, employees of industries or scientific utility or such like purposes. But without any “Restricted Liquor Stores” in the Districts as envisaged in the NLTP Act to take care of those exemptions, confuses the whole Act and encourages illegal sale of alcohol to meet the need.
The Act is not a total prohibition. Total prohibitions are the ones existing in the middle-eastern countries. Ours is partial prohibition, with a wide scope of exemptions irrespective of age and sex, liable to be checked by qualified doctors, prohibition director or prohibition officers. Punishment for commission of the offence under the Act is too light and lenient, to be of any use at all. The Bihar Excise (Amendment) Bill 2016 prescribes death penalty for those engaged in sale and manufacture of illicit liquor and stiff penalties in case of death of consumers, or injury. Besides, public nuisance by drunkards calls for jail terms and fines.
Both the Houses of Bihar Legislature adopted a resolution stating that they will not consume liquor and will discourage others from doing so. This is a clear indication of their commitment and sincerity in the Bihar Total Prohibition Act of liquor as the Act was enacted by them and we definitely expect similar action to be taken by our Nagaland Legislative Assembly for the welfare and safety of our people.
Our State Govt has the power to make rules or review the rules for the purpose of carrying out the provisions of this NLTP Act as envisaged under section 80 of the Act. The State Govt also has the power to remove any difficulties in the NLTP Act under section 84. Regulating the delegation of any powers by the Prohibition Director or by any other Prohibition Officers are empowered in section 80 (i).
However, one of the greatest impediments in our prohibition Act is the non-implementation of ‘State Prohibition Council’ consisting of two or more Officials and non- governmental Officials in the State and ‘Prohibition Committees’ consisting of two or more Officials and non -governmental Officials for all the districts of Nagaland. Although the same has been envisaged under section 27 of the NLTP Act, but was not constituted.
Alcohol, opium and marijuana have medicinal property; however we cannot treat lightly the question of making them available in our fragile Naga society for random sale by license. Therefore the licensing should be strictly for medical purpose, categorised foreigners, industrial workers or for scientific utility only. The Church’s deep concern is that our society and its Govt. should be cautious on this matter and must not be misinterpreted as ignorant, or that the nation is secular or it is denigrating other religions, as alleged by some of its critics.
Those who are advocating for lifting of the NLTP Act seem to believe that licensing can stop adulteration of alcohol, regulate pricing and provide clean alcohol to the alcoholics. We must first see what is happening in Nagaland before blindly believing in this theory. All petroleum retail outlets in Nagaland do have licences, but most either sell adulterated oil or the meters are manipulated. The Nagaland business community is not expected to behave differently just for alcohol business. Therefore the accusations that the Church is blocking the availability of clean alcohol and killing alcoholics with spurious drinks, is unfair and farfetched.
NBCC’s published survey and investigation revealed that our students’ performance in matriculation and pre-university examination was much better every time after the Prohibition Act, incidence of alcoholism dropped down drastically, women folk became safer at home or outside and the rate of alcohol related accidents came down, although its impact was not satisfactory in many areas. This sends out a loud message of strong condemnation of alcoholism, for those who are ready to listen to the call of PROHIBITION. But if Prohibition is lifted we may get back to the same old square or even worse.
We all know that evil consequences of alcoholism do not affect the drunken man alone. The lives of other innocent people are jeopardized by those whose minds and reactions have been impaired by alcohol abuse. Prohibiting the sale of liquor by law without practical follow up action at present is not effective at all, if the enforcing agency prefers to play safe with the legal loopholes and if there is no support from the general public.
Only if there is a practical legal enactment based on people’s welfare, security and sentiment which is sincerely backed by the Govt. can the implementation be effective enough, in dealing with the rampant violators. This, we know from what our Naga society has suffered thus far because of the exploitation of the Legal Loopholes by few individuals who think only of “Dirty Profit” for themselves, regardless of the consequences.
Since, the Govt. cannot provide enough man power, it is requested to rectify the Legal Loopholes at the earliest as well as implement the long awaited “State Prohibition Council“ and “ Prohibition Committees”. The Act provides for the constitution of “State Prohibition Council” and “Prohibition Committee” in the districts to supervise the enforcement of the NLTP Act.
It is suggested that the State Govt. may immediately constitute the Council and Committees for each district and delegate necessary authorities to the duly constituted public committees in the State as well as in the Districts to enforce the Act. It is further suggested that the State Prohibition Council may study the NLTP Act of 1989 in detail and suggest remedial measures. This venture is worth sacrificing for and is the reason of our support for the prohibition Act, in spite of the aforesaid loopholes.
NLTP Act is not the property of the Church, it is the property of everyone for our own uplift – morally, physically, economically, educationally, spiritually, politically and for our character development. So we must all give our best to let the State Govt. rectify the Legal Lacunas and we on our part should take the Prohibition Act in letter and spirit, as a Naga peoples’ movement against the destructive power of alcohol, to redeem our society, instead of playing the blame game and hating each other.