Easy access from Karnataka, porous borders, and lack of intervention of the Police and Excise departments are making the banks of the Kabani a safe haven for the illicit liquor mafia.
Winos are increasingly dependent on small shops and carriers selling spurious liquor in remote villages on the banks of the Kabani.
Except a five-star hotel, all other bar hotels and many outlets of the State Beverages Corporation in the district had downed shutters consequent to the new liquor policy.
“Tapping the potential, mafia groups, which focussed on smuggling spirit and cannabis from Karnataka, are turning to spurious liquor as well,” says P.R. Sreejith, lawyer and environmentalist.
Villagers and people in tribal hamlets on the banks of the river and its tributaries are the main customers.
Liquor is sold in sachets (90 ml), similar to the liquor sachets of the Karnataka State Beverages Corporation, at Rs. 30 to Rs.120 depending on demand.
“Though both the packets look similar, the taste is quite different,” a regular client at Chekadi said.
It is suspected that the mafia brew liquor at Anamalam, a settlement inside the Nagarhole Tiger Reserve in Karnataka, and ferry it across the Kabani river.
They have bases at Machoor, Bairakuppa, and Bavali, on the other side of the river, to conduct the trade, Mr. Sreejith says.
The operators are employing tribespeople and children as carriers, says Kamala, a tribeswoman at Perikkallur.
The number of liquor shops has increased considerably in the border towns of Karnataka and Tamil Nadu after the State’s new liquor policy, an Excise Department source said.
The Commercial Tax Department has four check-posts at various locations on the Kerala- Tamil Nadu border but the Excise Department has none, he said.
