Chirag Paswan Comments on 'Tari'
After Jitan Ram Manjhi, the former chief minister of Bihar, argued that ‘tari is a natural drink‘ and that the state’s ban on it should be abolished, Chirag Paswan, the current president of the Lok Janshakti Party Ram Vilas (LJPR) and a member of the Jamui assembly, backed up his assertion.
“We can’t compare tari to alcohol… It cannot be grouped with alcoholic beverages. Tari is a source of income for countless Pasi people. It is their only source of income ” says Paswan .
It is a naturally occurring juice made from palm trees. Only Nitish Kumar and his bureaucrats would understand how it became alcoholic. Every district in the state has developed a liquor manufacturing facility, and the police are allowing it to run “Added he. “Nitish Kumar is sitting in a large Patna bungalow, while the poor Pasi community members’ present and future are in the dark. Nitish Kumar is blind to their situation. When they challenged the administration’s practise of filing FIRs and arresting them for selling tari, the Patna state police brutally beat them and imprisoned them. Since they are splitting the profits and the money is moving from the bottom to the top, Bihar’s police and other administrative officials are not arresting people involved in the illicit sale of alcoholic beverages, according to Paswan.
On November 29, thousands of members of the Pasi community marched in Patna, and the police used lathi charges to scatter them. On November 30, the day following the incident, Manjhi criticised the Nitish administration and demanded that tari be dropped from the list of alcoholic beverages. “Tari is a natural juice and excellent for the human body,” he noted.
State Chief Secretary Amir Subhani defended the state government, saying that “a few hours after manufacture, tari turned into an intoxicating drink due to fermentation in tari.”
In Bihar, the Pasi group has a sizable voter base, and Nitish Kumar does not want to lose their support.
