After pizzas, burgers, soft drinks and tobacco, Ramadoss has now targeted liquor. The minister says the new liquor policy to be formulated very soon will take a tough stand to restrict use of alcohol. Ramadoss says that this policy should have higher taxes for mixed alcoholic drinks like beer and vodka which are more popular with the females.
“Countries like Australia have recently taken measures against mixed alcoholic drinks which have been heavily taxed. We could soon have similar taxation measures being introduced in India with the new national policy on alcohol,” says our Union Minister for health. “Youngsters, basically girls, are getting more addicted to mixed alcoholic drinks, which is a dangerous trend. And we definitely need to put a serious check on sale of such liquors. Also important is the location of liquor shops which cannot be positioned anywhere and everywhere” he adds.
As if this is not enough. Our minister is also unhappy with the uneven distribution of liquor shops in residential areas and says that there should be a check by the state governments in allocating the areas of such shops.
“Average age of drinkers in our country is 19 and is supposed to be 15 in the next three years. And if we still continue with the surrrgate advertisemenst of acohol brands then your younger generation could be in big trouble. Even the filmstars should take moral responsibility and not act for any liquor scene,” he states.
The big question here is: if the youngsters are within the drinking age limit, who is Ramadoss to play moral police and check the consumption pattern? The strata that he is talking about can well afford its drinks, so they may not just mind shelling out a few rupees more. From the health perspective, is he not putting them in grave danger of experimenting with cheaper versions like tharra? For the ones who are habitual will source it out from wherever. Shouldn’t he just leave things at raising awareness and let the young adults decide for themselves?
2 Comments
May 1, 2008 at 9:35 am
Yes, certainly Dr Ramadoss has lost his psychological stability. Ramadoss has been losing numerous battles on his anti-tobacco front, like when he got a rude shock when his plan of implementation of pictorial warnings on cigarettes was to a degree run down by a few ministers.
But that did not make him focus his attention towards the introduction of anti-smoking drugs in the country, which could have been a great success if launched on a scale similar to the Polio Eradication programme.
Instead he thought it better to shift his focus on liquor to cover up his failure. & then he comes up with a great idea, mounting the taxes on liquor, at a time when the country is bleeding under colossal inflation. Taking Ramadoss’ example of Australiaone should also take note that Australian liquor laws are much less repressive than India, their per capita income is $37,500 as against India’s income of $2,700, as well as they have well over 40 varieties of alcohol brands to choose from.
In this country, his laws can lead to two scenarios
Scenario 1- One cannot impede a drunkard from being drunk, but due to the current level of taxes at least a few people are able to buy high-quality alcohol which is to a great extent better than the local brands. His plans will increase the use of local brands, thus increasing the number of cancer cases & other health problems.
Or consider another scenario, drunkards do not compromise on their drinking habits, as a result their household is under more monetary pressure, which other members of the family will have to bear upon themselves.
& for the young girls (who are immensely rich too) he is talking about, it wont stop them from consumption of liquor but will improve their status among their peers as they’re among those who have enough money to splurge on a high-end alcohol brand.
Whatever Mr Ramadoss does, he does in surfeit; ponder about his fury on the Bangalore Cricket Team due to the insertion of the term “Royal” in their name, so even the Rajasthan team has it. So why not prohibit both the cricket teams from playing, as it is IPL is bad for health as it is making many people stick to their TV sets in place of working. So are we expecting an Anti-IPL Campaign in the near future?
Though his objective is good, however Dr Ramadoss should keep in mind that such campaigns are not executed by whims & fancies but proper planning.
He should rather implement restrictive measures like regulating the amount of alcohol going into a particular household in place of mindless preventive measures.
Shouvanik Dey
Delhi
May 6, 2008 at 3:36 pm
Mahesh Kumar E-Mail: maheshkumar0909@gmail.com
Ph.41513557, 23417413
Kolaba Chambers,
C-25/5, Connaught Place,
New Delhi 110 001
Dated: May6, 2008
The Editor-Letters
Metro Now
Dear Editor,
Our Health Minister Mr. Ramadoss acting in Bollywood style –for publicity-as film people do –to remain in limelight and criticizing Bollywood stars! If smoking and drinking scenes are so harmful –is not the fact that in actual life these products are most harmful than why instead of asking film stars to do such scenes , the government ban the production of these two items in India( ? ) and lose the revenue. Can our commercial government do so?
Further, drinking wine / alcohol is health hazard. So why in metro cities the local government has own selling liquor shops and why bars are allowed in clubs and hotels etc.
Yours faithfully,
(Mahesh Kumar)