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THE FACTUAL FLASHBACK

6. The Kuttippuram Police registered a case as Crime No. 290/2010 under the caption "unnatural death" with regard to the dead body of an unidentified male aged about 35 years found on the platform of the Kuttippuram Railway Station at 6.25 p.m. on 5-09-2010. Later on, the dead body was identified as that of one Dhanasekharan, a native of Tamil Nadu. After inquest over the deadbody was held it was sent to the Medical College, Kozhikode for autopsy. The postmortem findings revealed that the deceased died due to consumption of noxious toddy. A further probe by the Kuttippuram Police brought to light that the deceased had consumed adulterated toddy from a toddy shop at Kuttippuram. Thereupon the caption "unnatural death" under Sec. 174 Cr.P.C. was deleted from the FIR and the aforementioned offences were added. Consequent on the death of a few others within the limits of the Kuttippuram & Tirur Police Stations, the Kuttippuram Police registered Crime Nos. 291 to 295 and 297 of 2010 and the Tirur Police registered Crime Nos. 667 to 670 and 672 of 2010 for the aforementioned offences . Considering the seriousness of the case, the investigation of the cases was transferred to the Crime Branch Police which took over the investigation in all the above cases on 14-09-2010. During the course of investigation it was revealed that all the dead persons had consumed noxious toddy from the toddy shops situated at Kuttippuram, Beeranchira and Perassannur which were conducted by A1 (Dravyan) who was running the toddy shops at Kuttippuram and Perassannur where the licensees were A2 and A3. The licensees of the Beeranchira toddy shops are accused Nos. 4 to 7. Samples of the toddy kept for sale in the toddy shops were collected and sent for chemical analysis. The report of chemical analysis showed that the toddy contained Methyl Alcohol (Methanol) which is the poison used for denaturing rectified spirit. The noxious toddy was sold under the name "speed toddy" besides which pure tapped toddy was also sold. Hence, the persons responsible for the sale of "speed toddy" very well knew that it was toddy mixed with chemicals intended for enhancing the intoxicating strength of the liquor. What is revealed is a criminal conspiracy by A1 to A18 to make huge profits by selling spurious toddy instead of pure toddy and A1 along with A16 to A18 had mixed methanol with toddy in pursuance of the criminal conspiracy hatched between A1 and A18. 14 persons died after consuming illicit toddy from the toddy shops at Kuttippuram , Perassannur and Beeranchira within the limits of the Kuttippuram and Tirur Police Stations. 10 persons died after consuming the noxious toddy from the toddy shop at Vaniyambalam within the limits of the Wandoor Police Station. "Alcohol" has ruined several families. It is the filthy lucre which had impelled the accused persons to sell noxious toddy unmindful of the catastrophe which was in store for the poor consumers most of whom were tamilians.