Summer of 2014 in Punjab

After reading a post on one of the social networking site that glorified promotion of alcoholism by an ignorant father to teenagers of 13-14 year old I have come to the conclusion that alcoholism and drug addiction is two way traffic. The hectic activity of Punjab Police and Punjab government alone will not bring the change. As it is the efforts made by the Punjab government are not enough because they are emphasizing on drug consumers and small dealers to eradicate the problem. The first step to drugs is alcoholism and that is rampant in Punjab. The parents particularly men think it is a manly thing to drink alcohol and they don’t stop at that and never try to become role model. The urge and greed to drink is shared publicly and boasted upon. In most marriages that I have visited the hosts reserve tables for men and each guest gets a bottle on his table and the guests greedily throw liquor inside as if the tummies are big drums that can consume large quantities of liquor, chicken, fried fish and mutton. These socially accepted norms actually astonish me because most women folk are cool with this kind of behavior. The story is repeated in each marriage and a very ugly drink culture has evolved and the compulsion factor that we have to do the same has become a trend. The grown- ups drink publicly and teenagers hide behind the bushes to drink. In the bargain marriage party becomes a booze Party.

A joint effort of Police, public and administration was erected to finish terrorism from Punjab and something to that nature has to come and this time larger public participation will be required to change the scenario in Punjab because the menace of drug addiction is more deadly than the terrorism. It is ruining everybody.