Tiruppur police arrested an individual on Sunday for keeping open a TASMAC outlet at Sirupuluvapatti Ring Road in Tiruppur district, despite the complete lockdown being in place.
A case under section 4(1)(a) of the Tamil Nadu Prohibition Act was registered against 28-year-old Veerapandi, who was in charge of the outlet. Veerapandi was arrested and later let out on bail. While thirty-eight bottles of liquor were seized by the police from the venue, the shop was not sealed.
Speaking to TNM, an officer from Tiruppur Commissioner’s office, says, “The police will patrol other parts of the city and file cases if they find similar violations.”
When the news was first reported, Tiruppur SP Vijayakarthikeyan K responded by saying police have been sent to the spot.
Police team is proceeding to the spot
— Vijayakarthikeyan K (@Vijaykarthikeyn) July 19, 2020
Tamil Nadu State Marketing Corporation Limited (TASMAC) outlets have been permitted to function in the district between 10 am to 8 pm on all days except Sundays, when the full lockdown comes into force across the state. In Chennai, the state’s biggest hotspot of COVID-19, TASMAC outlets are banned from opening for business.
Recently, TASMAC had invited tenders for computerising its operations, a project that includes an integrated supply chain management system, an enterprise resource management system and a track and trace system. The state-owned enterprise has closed all of its outlets for over 75 days due to the lockdown. According to reports, TASMAC enjoys a monopoly in the liquor market in the state, with 5,300 outlets and a sale of around Rs 90 crore per day.
As of July 18, Tiruppur has 217 active COVID-19 cases. The district has reported 433 cases in total so far of which 212 have been discharged. A total of 2,850 are under home quarantine. On July 18, Tiruppur tested 712 samples from patients showing COVID-19 symptoms.