Once every decade or so Gujarat toys nervously with the idea of giving up total prohibition only to retreat at the first salvo from the Gandhians. It is that season again. This time the tourism department is raising the issue wrapped up in concern for the tourist who has to go through the hassles of applying for a permit to consume alcohol and then cannot find a public bar to drink it in. Given that its historical sites, landscapes, artifacts and entertainments are second to none, Gujarat ought to be a prime tourist destination. If prohibition is keeping tourists away something should be done about it. But there is more merit than meets the eye in the tourism department proposal to make permits freely available to visitors to small towns and resorts beyond Ahmedabad, Surat and Baroda where permits are relatively easy to obtain. Whatever it does for the tourism industry, every anti-prohibitionist should welcome the proposal and urge the government to accept it because it would be the thin end of a necessarywedge. Before long permits could be freely available to more and more categories of people until eventually there is no need to issue permits at all. That method of abolishing prohibition would be very similar to the fashion in which Maharashtra eventually came to throw open its bars.Gujarat needs to rid itself of the albatross of prohibition one way or another, gradually lowering the barriers or sweeping them away at one go. Although the ban on alcohol is said to be an article of faith in the land of Gandhiji's birth, it is common knowledge that it has increasingly become a pretence. The reality behind the hypocrisy and false piety is that private drinking is commonplace, interrupted on the rare occasion by raids by the prohibition squad. Many others - Andhra Pradesh most recently - have learned prohibition is unworkable. It makes drinking more expensive, it does not prevent alcohol abuse. It does not make people virtuous, it turns them into law-breakers. The evidence is all around that prohibition does more harm than good, spawning criminal mafia in every major town in Gujarat and corrupting the police, politicians, bureaucracy and many people. Hardheaded realism also says governments should not forgo the revenue from liquor licences and sales tax.The Gandhians are there still trying to bar the gate. They should not be brushed aside nor should they, in turn, ignore the social and moral harm prohibition causes. Gandhians need to rethink things. Abstemiousness, austerity, all things in moderation - these values can be commended to the individual in the private sphere. They are not ideas around which public policy ought to be built. Regulation is necessary as are the usual precautions against misuse such as keeping alcohol out of the reach of children and restricting public drinking hours. Anything more is better left to civil society which should be encouraged to take up its responsibilities. Alcoholism is an ever present danger and has wrecked many lives. Gandhian moral persuasion has a better chance of preventing individuals from drinking excessively than prohibition ever did.
