Eleven more deaths due to the consumption of spurious liquor have been confirmed in Uttar Pradesh’s Aligarh district, pushing the toll in the incident to 36, PTI reported on Monday.
The police have so far arrested 17 people in the case, The Indian Express reported. As many as 21 officials have been suspended. UP Excise Commissioner P Guruprasad has been removed from his post, according to PTI.
Bhanu Pratap Kalyani, Aligarh’s chief medical officer, said 71 bodies were sent for post-mortem analysis from Friday to Monday forenoon.
“Liquor poisoning has been confirmed as the cause of death for 36 of these people,” the official said, according to PTI.
Kalyani added that the 35 others were also suspected to have died after consuming spurious liquor, but the cause of their deaths will be confirmed after a viscera report.
Of the 36 who died due to alcohol poisoning, 10 were from Karsua village in Aligarh. The licence of the shop that sold liquor to the villagers had expired in March last year and a complaint was filed against it in October, according to The Indian Express.
The shop opened again after the Uttar Pradesh government eased Covid-19-related curbs in May, allowing liquor outlets in several districts to open.
Meanwhile, opposition parties alleged that the authorities did not conduct a post-mortem analysis of the bodies of 12 people, according to PTI. Samajwadi Party leader Zameerullah demanded that the state government give compensation to their families.
