Barabanki, January 10: Two people have been killed and three have been admitted to the hospital after consuming illicit liquor in Barabanki district of Uttar Pradesh. In December 2017, about 1,400 cartons of illicit liquor was recovered from Ballia and Bulandshahar districts of Uttar Pradesh. As per reports from Ballia, 1,335 cartons of illicit liquor were recovered from a farm in Bairiya area following a tip-off. After police investigations, Ballia’s superintendent of police Anil Kumar said that the farm belonged Virendra Singh, who is absconding.

On Monday, a bill passed by the state legislature recently on dealing with illicit liquor got the governor's nod. The bill says those dealing with illicit or spurious liquor in Uttar Pradesh may face the gallows as a stringent bill providing for a death penalty and life imprisonment to such offenders.  Uttar Pradesh now becomes the third state after Delhi and Gujarat to have an Act under which bootleggers may be sent to the gallows, if consumption of spurious liquor leads to loss of life.

As per PTI reports, the UP Excise (Amendment) Bill, 2017, has the provisions of a death penalty, a life sentence and a fine to the tune of Rs 10 lakh and not less than Rs five lakh in case of death due to consumption of spurious liquor.  It also provides for rigorous imprisonment up to ten years and not less than six years in case of disability caused by consumption of spurious liquor and fine to the tune of Rs five lakh and not less than Rs three lakh.

As part of anti-liquor mafia crackdown in Uttar Pradesh in December, about 104 boxes of illicit liquor of foreign brands were recovered in two raids in Bulandshahar. A total of five people were arrested. AS per reports by United News of India, Bulandshahar’s senior superintendent of police Muniraj G. saying that in a surprise check under anti-liquor mafia campaign, three men, namely, Sanjeev Kumar, Ghalib and Sanjay, were caught redhanded when they were mixing urea in smuggled liquor at Samay Bagh in the Aurangabad area.

(The above story first appeared on LatestLY on Jan 10, 2018 08:08 AM IST. For more news and updates on politics, world, sports, entertainment and lifestyle, log on to our website latestly.com).