What other topic to discuss other than the
heady news coming our way? Kerala will be in a complete state of alcohol prohibition by 2023.
Disclaimers first. I do drink. I do keep a bottle or two at home for occasions. But, if Oommen Chandy wants me not to touch liquor going forward, my life will just as it is today. Perhaps I might save a few morning headaches, but nothing of significance whatsoever. So, I do think that I can approach the subject of alcohol consumption objectively, not through the prisms of an addict, a fanboy or a hater.
The arguments for prohibition is widely known, well-articulated and easy to understand. And they are readily visible. For a short period of my college life, I used to stay near to an institution for rehabilitation for drug & alcohol addicts (and used to watch TV there. An all-time favorite cricket match of mine where Javagal Srinath & Anil Kumble won a match batting for India against Australia- I watched it there) . Live examples of lives turned upside down & potentials destroyed. And such examples are available to us around us. The chances of you turning 30+ in Kerala without personally being aware of at least one case of alcoholic addiction is a strange occurrence. Stories of responsible men toying with lives of their own as well as their family's. Enough is talked about on this.
Hence the outcry for prohibition. It is not just a phenomenon confined to Kerala. Prohibition has always been the societal reaction everywhere upon observing the evils of alcohol. Nobody in a position that has an accountability towards social common good cannot resist advocating for it. The case is clear-cut for institutions, like religious bodies, that hold the social conscience. The onus is on them to pressurize for an ideal state of society that they envision.
I want to resist the temptation of going into the subtle and finer political play and balance of power equations that would have influenced the Government's decision. As much as these political factors play a far more deciding role in a decision such as this, bringing them into the discussion table would only muddy the waters. Let the focus remain on the subject of prohibition, rather than the political nuances surrounding a decision to take that move at a given point in the fascinating chess of politics.
What is absent in the current narrative of prohibition is the cons of it. Words like "impractical" or "unrealistic" creep up in the cacophony. But, such words are either not fully explained or plain obtuse. Eventually, they are subdued by louder words like "lobby" or "selfish interests". It is nobody's argument that there is no lobby who is set to profit from the evils of alcohol. But the mute question is not whether an alcohol-free society is good or not, rather, what is the best way to reach that state.
That is where I differ from the position of mainstream media, mainstream organizations and the Government. I see that as a short-cut route most probable to disappoint us in the longer run. Imagine that you embark on a journey towards an island that you see across the shore. You see a speed boat on one side and a small rowing boat on the other side. You eagerly jump into the speedboat. You fire it up and scream past an initial set of oncoming waves. Then you realize that there is no fuel. You are 100 meters out in the sea and you lose the power. You drift along in the waters, eventually pushed back by the waves onto the shore. You step out of the boat and then mutter to yourself in disappointment "that island is too far". While you walk away, the rowing boat is still waiting for you out there.
Why do I think that prohibition is a speedboat with no fuel? A number of reasons:
1) It is a historically failed experiment.
Not just once. Not just one place. It was tried out in Kerala earlier. It was tried out in many other states in India. It was tried out around the world. It failed almost everywhere to varying degrees. In some cases, it has failed spectacularly.
To quote some examples within India, let's look at
Gujarat (which other state to quote as an example? Pun intended) .
Bootlegging is an industry itself there. Prohibition is
strictly only-official. Or, look at Mizoram that has admitted very recently about this
failed experiment officially.
The only places where prohibition has worked reasonably are the Muslim countries. The reason is obvious - it is prohibited in Islam. There is a very strong religious foundation to the social success of the method of prohibition in those places. India is not definitely a country with that kind of a foundation. Especially Kerala. It has a strong historical tradition of maintaining sections of society that produce and sell alcohol. A strong presence of Christians, who has no religious taboos against alcohol, compounds the acceptance of alcohol. So, wishing that a prohibitory system , that has only worked within the societies that treat alcohol as a sin, would work in our culture is just that - a WISH. (I must note that even in the strongest of Islamic societies, prohibition has worked only to an extend. Read this article on
Iran).
Now, history need not repeat, you could argue. I agree, but the burden of proof is on Oommen Chandy to tell me that why is he expecting prohibition to succeed in Kerala this time. I don't hear that. From anybody. If a system has failed everywhere, there has to be a solid reason for that failure. If you try to implement the same system without addressing that reason, you are setting yourself up for another failure. Closing down a few bars and the subsequent encouraging statistics does not in anyway challenge the reasons why prohibition has failed so many times in so many places. Prohibition is a very different topic as compared to closing down a few bars.
Alcohol consumption goes back to the very early beginnings of our societies. It is plain silliness to wish away that kind of a habit. Time and again, history has told us that if a sufficient number of people want to have something, they will have it, legally or otherwise. A very powerful personal deterrent is required for people to abstain from alcohol. It can be tradition, religion or a strong personal distaste. What it cannot be (as proven by past experiments) is a plain Government order. Without an overwhelming personal deterrent, the Government order becomes just another avenue for officials to take bribes, stamp personal vendettas selectively upon people and to trample the concept of law and order.
2) It leads to a consolidation of bad habits in a society, leading to criminal mafias.
This is a more subtle, yet more important aspect. When normal demand for anything is prohibited, the demand may diminish, but that in itself does not go away. But, normal everyday person does not have the wherewithal to produce the supply that will meet the demand. Thus, when the normal demand goes underground, the supply side is handled by those sections of society that handle the other underground activities, which are far more dangerous and illegal. These people will have political connections, liaisons with law enforcement agencies and muscle power to bring fear in a normal man's world. When a demand, as huge as the one for alcohol, is driven underground, the illegal vendors in the supply side get a huge fillip to their business. This results in a consolidation of criminal elements in a society, who grow in power according to the demand they receive in their underground activities. Instead of selling just drugs, prostitutes & quotation gangs (and everything from petty thefts to murders that come along with it), now they have a complete package of alcohol, drugs, prostitutes & quotation gangs. Even though that is just an addition on one item, the kind of demand & the number of people coming to underground with that single item is so huge. It is similar to having a Walmart-like demand in a mom-and-pop shop overnight.
It will take sometime for this consolidation to happen, because the underground market need to play out its course to mature. But, once complete, you are looking at the possibility of very powerful criminal mafias, aided by politicians and law enforcement officials to rule each and every aspect of the lives of local communities. The most spectacular story of all times is perhaps the
prohibition in the USA. It just took a decade of prohibition for USA to be the home of the most powerful mafias, may be as powerful or even more, as the Columbian drug cartels of today.
The USA prohibition story may be a horror story, and hence we may be hoping that such kind of things would not happen here. But, you do not need to have crimes of that scale to disturb the peace of our society. Simpler cases of bootlegging and related crimes, hooch tragedies are frequent everywhere prohibition is enforced without sufficient reduction of demand.
Of late, we have been doing a commendable job in the fight against tobacco. Huge public awareness programs, slow-but-steady enforcement of reasonable laws that deter people from smoking in public places and the restrictions of the promotion of tobacco products have gathered a huge momentum in killing a habit that was a cultural norm in the previous generation. Instead of focusing of adopting similar tactics against alcohol and uprooting its cultural basis, jumping into a shortcut route that is more probable to lead us nowhere in the long term is not a wise move, in my opinion. It takes struggle to row a boat over a turbulent sea, but you don't have a choice if that is the only probable method to reach the island far out there.
I cannot miss the fact that Oommen Chandy did two wise things. One, he has planned the prohibition to be completely in effect after ten years. Thus, we have sometime to turn the public demand for alcohol down, thereby creating a cultural situation where prohibition may succeed. Two, he has rightly appealed for people's support. His words tend to reinforce my thoughts - he is not sure about the success of his programme unless there is a mass support from those who consume alcohol at present. He knows that he enjoys the support of those who doesn't drink. But, that is not sufficient for the success of prohibition. Unless the consumers of alcohol turn against it, there is no way that the Kerala experiment will go down in history as a successful experiment on prohibition. As of now, the situation is this: we have taken a lottery and are waiting with a wish to win the first prize. The odds are very clear. The only question is: are we lucky enough? Are we THAT lucky?
