A shortsighted populist policy!

Starting 1st January 2023, the State of Kedah in Malaysia closed all their gaming outlets. Nobody in the state could place their bets on their lucky numbers in 4D, Toto, or DaMaiCai or buy lottery tickets anymore.

What they need to comprehend is that Man is very innovative when it comes to beating the system. I remember a neighbour during my childhood who ran a clandestine betting business. After taking all the bets for the day, he would sneak the counterfoils above the electricity switchboard that served the whole floor of the flat. If he gets caught, the police cannot put his involvement in it.

Again during my childhood, as the European-run estates came to a grinding halt, the estate-managed spirit shops also closed. Labourers, who by then were addicted to the bottle, got their fix from bootleg booze. They had to settle for locally brewed concoctions because they were out of jobs, and legal liquor cost too much. Methanol poisoning caused blindness to many and cost their lives to some.

Lessons from the American 1920s Prohibition Law are worth revisiting. During the roaring 20s, easy access to alcohol was determined to be the root of most social ills. The frequent wild parties that led to deaths, the increase in alcoholism and the frequent absence from work as mass production was in high gear were blamed on booze.

The Churches, Women Empowerment groups and even Ku Klax Klan were all for the Volstead Law, which prohibited the production, transportation, sales and importation of alcoholic beverages except for ceremonial wines and liquor for private (the affluent) consumption.

As days went on, supporters of Prohibition decreased as they were unhappy with what they saw. There was widespread thuggery, shootings and racketeering. The police force had never seen such amounts of bribery. The number of outlets, called speakeasies, illegal, of course, paradoxically increased during Prohibition. The noble intention to curb access to alcohol actually backfired, with the government of the day getting no revenue from its sales.

Entrepreneurs became creative. The so-called ‘bathtub gin’ became a thing when water from the bathtub tap was added to the premixed powder to produce gin. Cakes with fermented grapes were sold past the expiry date to achieve the desired effect. And methanol poisoning reared its ugly head too.

Rather than banning something outright, the more sensible thing is legislating all these so-called sinful activities, booze, cigarettes, gambling and even the flesh trade. Outlawing them is akin to burying one’s head under the sand. The rest of the world will just go on, business as usual. At least you can go on with life, convincing yourselves that, at least in the afterlife, all will be hunky dory to eternity.

This work is licensed under Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International. 

It started with a fizz...

A sign of women empowerment?

Gin and Tonic - a lady's drink?

Gin shops, unlike taverns, had 

feminine interior with pink walls,

mirrors and lacey curtains.

It started with COVID-19 and the movement control order. Even though the notification notices from my WhatsApp had been disabled for the next year, curiosity took the better of me. I was curious where those 100 over messages came from. Was I so likeable that people found that extra time to keep my acquaintance?

First, there was a debate on whether hydroxychloroquine was effective against coronavirus infections. The messages went a full circle, finally ending up with two sides vehemently defending or denying its usefulness. Both back up their stands with statistics and accuse the other of sabotage. One party said there is no rational explanation to use an antibiotic to fight a virus; a vaccine is needed. The other quoted success story with recovery numbers; to use what is freely available. The question of vested financial gains kept cropping up.

Yet another group suggested that perhaps nothing would be lost by prophylactically consuming hydroxychloroquine, not in its synthetic form but rather in its equivalent of the real McCoy. Quinine, its precursor, derived initially from a bark tree, is freely available as tonic water (~80mg/litre). So, what a way to combine work and pleasure than to sip gin and tonic?

Gin Lane, where mothers forgot
breastfeeding their infants during
the Gin Craze.

Gin as a drink made itself to the tropics because of British efforts to civilise the natives. After defeating Tipu Sultan in India, the British found many of their soldiers were down with malaria. As prophylaxis against the disease, they introduced quinine combined with gin as a refreshing evening drink. The ever-admiring natives also followed suit and gin-tonic. To date, it remains a favourite drink amongst Western-educated elitists in most urban pubs even though Anopheles, the plasmodium carrying mosquito, has long migrated to the countryside.

Even earlier, in the 18th century, gin was promoted as a Protestant drink by William of Orange to offset the import of French brandy and wines to the UK. More importantly, the Crown wanted to impoverish the Local Distillers' Guild. Local breweries and drinking houses were encouraged. Women were empowered and drawn into the industry as distillers and shopowners. It led to a Gin Craze with a nation of extreme drunkenness, abandonment of economic duties and neglect of social responsibilities. Taxes were introduced repeatedly to discourage over-indulgence, invoking ire among the people and finally, a riot. The people's interest in gin waned as the price of grain became more expensive, distillation was costly and earning power was low.

So be wary when someone says, "there is nothing a stiff drink cannot fix!" The first one could be the beginning of the many problems that need to be fixed later. 

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.

Money sanitises everything?

Raees (Hindi, 2017)
When a man is desperate, when his next meal is an impossible dream, any form of work that comes his way is God-sent. He will be grateful that the Divine forces are responsive to his pleas to meet his biological need. When his position is a bit stable, he introspects. He wonders whether his line of duty may irk the Creator. He feels guilty. He knows that his line of work is not sanctioned by the religious leaders who delved into this type of theological matters. He knows he has himself knee deep to retreat. His dependents, who by now are quite used to the good life start demanding. He would set his own modified rules, cherry picking rules and regulations to justify his illicit trade. He draws his boundaries, area which are a no-no and would defend his modified predilections to the core. Deep inside, he knows of his ill actions. To sanitise his 'sins', which actually do not appear in his psyche anymore, he immerses himself in philanthropic deeds and in the quest to uplift society in a Robin Hood manner.

This are some of the thoughts that went through my mind as I viewed Shah Rukh Khan's latest offering, Raees. The formula of the storyline is nothing new, just the time test money churning flick of rags to riches ala-Godfather style, only the settings are different. This time the Prime Minister's state of Gujarat which had outlawed alcohol sales since 1949, after the demise of Gandhi, under the Bombay Prohibition Act.

Legally Gujarat is a 'dry' state, as no one wants to stir the sentiments of the public as the abhorrence to alcohol is started as a mark of respect to his assassination. In reality, moonshine is still available, sometimes cheaper from other states as the merchandise is adulterated and no taxes need to be paid.

Even though, the filmmakers deny any resemblance to any living or dead characters, the film is said to to be loosely based on a criminal named Abdul Latif, a Mumbai gangster linked to many criminal activities including supplying RDX explosives in the 1993 Mumbai blast. The movie follows a predictable pattern with all the winning formulas of tear, gore, revenge, blood, love and emotions to drive home the point that a life of crime does not pay. And that even ruthless gangster have a soft spot and code of conduct.

N.B. Time and time again, it is evidently clear that Prohibition of alcohol does not give the desired effect. Conversely, it gives a paradoxically opposite response. When this strategy was implemented in the 1920s in the US in response to ill effects of  alcohol, what was achieved was not abstinence but bootlegging, complications of adulteration, gangsterism, senseless killing and a corrupt police force! The correct approach may be the way the British thumbed communist activities in Malaya in a propaganda that "wins the heart and mind". Sadly, we are still in want of such a strategy!