By IANS,
Varanasi : The Uttar Pradesh government has ordered a magisterial probe into the hooch tragedy that claimed at least eight lives in the state’s Varanasi and Bhadohi districts Monday, officials said.
Till now four people suspected of supplying the hooch have been arrested, while eight officials, including three police inspectors, have been suspended for failing to check the supply of illicit liquor.
Of the 15 people who are being treated in different hospitals, the condition of six is stated to be critical, the officials said.
“The magisterial enquiry is under way. Strict action would be taken against all those officials who had failed to check the supply of illicit liquor,” Varanasi range Deputy Inspector General of Police D.K. Thakur told reporters in this city, some 300 km from Lucknow.
Meanwhile, Bhadohi police chief Gyaneshwar Tiwari said that preliminary investigations showed the local police’s lackadaisical approach in checking the manufacture and sale of the spurious liquor.
Of the eight deaths, five took place in villages under the Chaura police station in Bhadohi, while the remaining three occurred under the adjoining Kupsethi police station in Varanasi.