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Students stage anti-liquor dharna

Gandhian ideals: Students of A.M.U.P. School, Valluvambram, staging a dharna in front of the Collectorate in Malappuram on Monday expressing solidarity with the State Prohibition Council.

MALAPPURAM: Students of A.M.U.P. School, Valluvamburam, sat in dharna in front of the Collectorate here on Monday expressing solidarity with the State Prohibition Council in its agitation against liquor. The students caught the attention of the passersby when they sat under a shamiana along with the satyagrahis of the Prohibition Council wearing Gandhi caps.

About 30 students took part in the dharna. A few of them were girls.

They arrived at the Collectorate premises by mid-day and remained there till evening.

School authorities said the students were permitted half-day leave to express their resentment against liquor.

Abdul Rafeeque A., the school’s Hindi teacher, said that it was a few recent deaths owing to alcohol and drunk driving at Valluvamburam that prompted the students to rise against the dangers of liquor. The Health Club of the school took up the matter and decided to stage a dharna, expressing solidarity with the State Prohibition Council.

The Prohibition Council has been staging a satyagraha in front of the Collectorate here for over a month demanding restoration of prohibition powers to local bodies.

Several organisations and civic bodies, including the district panchayat, already rallied behind the Prohibition Council in its agitation against liquor.

The students who sat in dharna here said that they were permitted and encouraged by their parents to do so. Mr. Rafeeque said the students of only the seventh standard were chosen for the dharna as all parents might not agree to the idea of sending their children to the venue of an agitation.

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