Bhubaneswar, Dec 14: The mind-boggling operation to count the Rs 351 crore in cash seized in raids in Odisha and Jharkhand has come as an explosive event that may not quite have stayed in the spotlight as it took all of six days.

One has to know how such a huge volume of money was stashed. Was it possible without the support of bureaucrats and local politicians, especially those belonging to the ruling Biju Janata Dal (BJD)?

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People with knowledge of country-liquor manufacturing and sale reveal a startling fact about the devastating design behind the trade that claims a huge number of lives. A liquor manufacturer and trader gets a license for producing and selling a limited quantity of the liquid. And for this, they are provided with a required amount of raw material like mahua flowers and spirits. However, tempted by the market demand, they often procure more raw materials from unauthorised sources and sell the produce in a wider market.

A packet of country-liquor sells between Rs 20 to Rs 40 a packet. The net consumers are the poor people, most of who are dalits and tribals. Many of the tipplers, as claimed by the locals, suffer from bad health and finally die, because of their prolonged consumption of substandard spirits.

Another startling fact that often hides behind the sight is that thousands of boxes of country-liquor produced in Western Odisha are procured by Dadan Sardars or labour contractors who send thousands of local people to other states as migrant workers to work in brick kilns. The poor migrant workers, who get intoxicated with the drink, shed major portions of their income to this design. The liquor traders often supply the liquid on credits and charge hefty interest rates on them. Thus, the money gets multiplied.

One wonders if it is possible on the part of the liquor manufacturers and distributors to push in barrels of the liquid into market or circulate in other states without the support of the excise department officials of the Odisha government and patronization by top bureaucrats and political bosses.

Simply put, the Odisha government cannot wash its hands off the entire episode and it must come clean on the matter.

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The stupendous counting operation defied imagination as 40 counting machines, besides 40 on standby to compensate for frequent breakdowns, 80 State Bank of India and income tax officials working day and night save for toilet, food and fatigue breaks and air-dryers to help separate notes sticking because of mildew from long storage had to deal with the biggest ever cash stash discovered in the history of income tax raids.

The Income Tax (I(-T) department, before stepping up the probe towards answering the why and how of black money generation on such a stupendous scale, must look into the intriguing facts like not a single note of duplicate currency turning up in 176 bags of Rs 100, 200 and 500 denominations.

While that may be a tribute to the honesty of tipplers who are readymade customers for various alcoholic drinks made from the base mixing material, which is the extra neutral alcohol being manufactured at this company’s distillery, the captivating connection to politics is what makes this case unique.

The Rajya Sabha MP from Jharkhand, Dheeraj Sahu, might struggle to disown his links to the cash stash scandal as his son is the MD and brother the chairman of the group that was behind the spinning of this tale of booze for cash that defies stringent accountability and accounting mechanisms like taxes, excise, VAT and income-tax.

Among India’s least well-kept secrets is the politician-bureaucrat-police-distiller-brewer-nexus that yields untold amounts of unaccounted money that may go to fund political parties and poll expenses. No wonder then that the Congress party was the butt of scorn and ridicule for proximity to such a huge stash before it promptly distanced itself from its MP.

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It is well-known that liquor, despite all the high sin taxes levied on it, is still the cash cow to serve as the provider of money to grease hands. Those who have generated such an amount owe an explanation to the authorities. The politicians and their parties will, of course, bank on clever deniability to keep their distance from those who are caught with the proceeds of the till.

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