City youth battles against hooch with documentary

AHMEDABAD: Shantaben Valera was pressurised into signing a document stating that her husband, Valjibhai, had consumed poison. In reality Valjibhai, a resident of Panch Bungalow on Gita Mandir Road, had drunk hooch that day and after getting an adverse reaction, was taken to hospital. Recalling the incident, Shantaben said, "When the police in VS Hospital were pressurising me to sign the documents, the doctors were refusing to attend to my husband until I signed the dotted line."
Though later Valjibhai’s brother signed the document, an opportunity to save her husband was delayed and he became one of the first victims of the infamous hooch tragedy of 2009.
In Odhav, Hashmukhbhai Parmar, a mason, and Jaswant Makwana, an autorickshaw driver, became blind after drinking hooch. All these are stories of the tragedy which are vividly captured in a documentary called ‘Sorry Mr Mahatma’.
Made by freelance filmmaker Umesh Solanki, the documentary puts its audience face to face with tales narrated by the victims who have now become blind and widows of victims.
Solanki aims to highlight the aftermath of the tragedy in the hope of sensitising the society of the consequences of drinking hooch. "Till now, I have distributed around 80 complementary copies to NGOs, social workers, mediapersons and enthusiastic people at large," he said.
"I will now be including subtitles in English and uploading it on the internet as an open source and later I will screen the documentary in areas where hooch is sold and consumed."
The one man army is the producer, director, researcher, scriptwriter, cameraman and editor of the documentary. He added, "Mahatma Gandhi preached against liquor and worked to uplift dalits. Hooch tragedies are indicators of a society that has parted ways with the values of the Father of the Nation."