Divya Kumari (name changed to protect identity) is a regular college-going 23-year-old, who spends a lot of her life on her new iPhone 14. Quite unlike many young women though, she has paid for the phone herself. Ms. Kumari steps out of her hostel in Patna, with an air of someone who is going to meet a friend. Underneath her loose salwar-kameez are strapped on two bottles of Glenfiddich, a single malt whisky.
She waits for a call that tells her the coast is clear— there is no police along the way from her hostel to where she needs to deliver the alcohol. She boards an auto and goes to a house in Kankarbagh. Here, she calls the man she had had a conversation with about 20 minutes ago. He has a string of people watching the route to make sure it is ‘safe’. He calls the client, who opens the door and receives the liquor. There is a quick QR code scanning process and transfer of money. He is not yet a regular, so udhar (later payment) will not be considered yet. Ms. Kumari has made her delivery for the day. She will get ₹5,000 for this, ₹2,500 for each bottle. Depending on the brand, her earnings can go up to ₹3,500. Her work is done only in the daytime, when the police guard is down.
Across ‘dry’ Bihar’s 38 districts, 15,831 women, from April 2016— when prohibition was introduced— to December 2022, have been arrested on charges of violating the prohibition law of the State. These include bootlegging and alcohol consumption, with the latter forming less than 2% of the arrests. This is according to official data released by the State’s Prohibition and Excise Department, exclusively to The Hindu. The total arrests made during the same period, are 5,17,419, including bootleggers and consumers.
“The major concern is that the numbers [of women bootleggers] are increasing every passing year. Initially, the number was less than 100 a year, but now it has touched more than 1,000,” a senior official of the excise department said, on condition of anonymity.
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There is no single profile of the women who smuggle alcohol. Of those who have been caught are middle-aged women posing as devotees and a third-year MBBS student.
Ironically, Chief Minister Nitish Kumar had banned the trading, supplying, storing, and consumption of liquor in the State citing the appeal of women. It was believed that this would bring down domestic violence rates and the money spent on alcohol would go towards family expenditure or savings.
In 2022, the Bihar government announced the setting up of factories to make glass bangles out of seized liquor bottles through a rural livelihood programme Jeevika.
On the ‘job’
Women bootleggers have distinct advantages in a job market, albeit illegal, where they get paid higher than their male counterparts, though the employers are still men. For starters, they are less likely to get caught, and so are in greater demand. They get paid more than men— up to 50% of the MRP, where men get about 25%. Considering they mainly smuggle imported and Indian-made foreign liquor (IMFL), the more expensive alcohol, their earnings per bottle are higher.
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Women do lower volumes, and use slightly different methods of carting the bottles: they hide them on their person or carry them in sacks, hidden in atta or rice, depending on their age and profile. Men have used ambulances, postal vans, gas cylinders, even coffins, in the past. There are of course fewer women bootleggers than men, who mostly have the lower end of the market— 8PM, Royal Stag, Royal Challenge, and Blender’s Pride.
“Female bootleggers are more trustworthy. Many times, male bootleggers run away with the consignment, and it takes us a lot of time to track them down,” says a person running an illegal liquor operation in Patna. “Women can easily get through police check-posts too,” he says, adding that women police especially at border posts are few.
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The model works from a customer’s standpoint too. Somesh Kumar (name changed to protect identity), a frequent buyer who asks for a woman bootlegger because they do not ask for extra money at the time of delivery. “We need to change the location of the delivery and don’t ask them to visit the same place again and again,” as the same woman making frequent deliveries may raise eyebrows, he says.
There are code words between buyers and sellers: A quart (180 ml) is referred to as chavanni (25 paise), a 360 ml bottle is called an athhani (50 paise) or aadha kilo (half a kg), a 750 ml bottle ek kilo (one kg) or ek rupiya (Re. 1). Blender’s Pride is called badriprashad; rum is Ramesh; vodka is safed paani (white water).
Police sources say that most of the women bootleggers who have been caught, were found in the areas that border other States and Nepal: Kishanganj (West Bengal, Nepal), Kaimur (Uttar Pradesh), Rohtas (Jharkhand), Araria (Nepal), Jamui (Jharkhand), and Darbhanga (less than 100 km from the Nepal border), and East Champaran (Nepal).
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Dr. Bakshi Amit Kumar Sinha, Assistant Professor, Centre for Economic Policy and Public Finance (CEFFP) at the Asian Development Research Institute (ADRI), Patna, said that the State’s borders with Uttar Pradesh, Jharkhand, West Bengal, and also an international border with Nepal make it geographically vulnerable to “a parallel economy of black money in which big liquor mafias are involved”.
It is important for the liquor syndicate to choose women familiar with the routes, so that they can cross the border away from police eyes. Rural women navigate some part of the forest and inner roads, going through areas where there is little police presence.
Ms. Kumari, who is originally from Siwan, goes across the border to Jharkhand twice a week, before she delivers the alcohol locally in Patna. She is studying for a post-graduate degree, and has been doing this ‘work’ for a year and a half. “I enjoy what it brings: branded clothes, cosmetics. Last year I had a Samsung Galaxy and today I have the latest iPhone 14,” she says, adding that she will have the 15 series iPhone Pro when launched.
Women with little choice
Unlike Ms. Kumari, but much like many women across India, 32-year-old Swati Devi (name changed to protect privacy), manages her home and her children most of the time. Like Ms. Kumari though, she too delivers alcohol. She got the ‘job’ through a neighbour, who also does the same in Vaishali district, where they live.
For Ms. Devi, who is unlettered, bootlegging is a way of supporting her family, after her husband, a daily wager, died three years ago. “I don’t have any other job or source of income. Smuggling liquor is quick money. There is a risk, but what would I feed my four children if I don’t do this work?” she says, adding she deals in 60-80 bottles every month.
Ms. Devi, who has been in the business for two years now, has been caught thrice. She bribed the police the first couple of times (bribes are in the region of ₹5,000 to ₹10,000), but spent five months in jail the third time. She has been out on bail for six months now, and continues to carry liquor.
The thekedar (contractor) picks up the tab of these ‘losses’ and also provides the women with legal support and advocates who take up their cases. One such liquor baron from Patna said, “Women bootleggers are very important for us because they can reach places where men cannot. So, we ensure to get them out as soon as possible if they are caught by the police. We provide them legal support in terms of getting them a good advocate and money to make the process of getting them out of jail quickly.”
Another bootlegger Richa, from Samastipur district, who is based out of Patna and currently studying for an exam for a government job, says they are trained properly before they are put on the job. On their first outing, they are sent with someone collecting the alcohol or doing a delivery. Men from the syndicate watch them carefully to make sure they are ready for the actual pick and drop.
She carries the liquor on trains. “I have been instructed to leave the bottles if any raids are conducted by the police or RPF (Railway Protection Force) during the journey. On a few occasions, the RPF did check the bogies and I had to leave the liquor in the train itself and not even touch it. On the next trip I managed the loss by bringing a few extra bottles,” she says, adding that she doesn’t carry more than eight bottles.
Patna-based political and social analyst Dr. Sanjay Kumar said prohibition in Bihar has been a failure. “The Nitish Kumar government has not created enough job opportunities in the State and…women entering into the business of liquor smuggling is one example,” he said, alluding to the hooch tragedies as well.
While the State government has taken several measures from drone cameras and helicopters to sniffer dogs and portable X-ray machines, smuggling of liquor continues in the State. Most drinking takes place in the quiet of homes, with just family or a very small group of friends, so the gathering does not attract the attention of the police.
But the focus is not so much on buyers as it is on suppliers. “By the time we are close to cracking a case, the bootleggers change their modus operandi of smuggling liquor. This is the major challenge we are facing to implement the prohibition law in Bihar,” an official of the excise department said.
Additional Director General (ADG)— Prohibition, Amrit Raj said, “We are taking all the measures to enhance the system…We are using intelligence to nab the big liquor mafia in other States.”
However, 1.86 crore litres of alcohol, both country-made and foreign liquor have been so far seized, since April 2016. According to the data of Bihar government, a total of 3,61,077 cases were registered until December 2022, in violation of the prohibition law. In 2016, up to 53,139 cases were registered and the number has been increasing year on year, touching 96,157 in 2022 alone. The total arrests made so far have been 5,17,419 until December 2022.
