Sagar hooch tragedy: Police uncover Statewide fake liquor racket with Delhi link
Sagar: Police investigating the hooch tragedy in Madhya Pradesh's Sagar district, in which at least 20 people have died earlier this month, say they have uncovered a statewide network that manufactured counterfeit liquor, with links to a chemicals supplier in Delhi.
Officials told The Hindu on Saturday (September 19, 2026) that 14 people were arrested over the previous two days. Among them is Anupam Giri, the owner of Delhi-based RN Chemicals, who is accused of supplying industrial spirit to those manufacturing the counterfeit liquor. He is in the custody of the Sagar police.
Investigating the first two information reports (FIRs) registered in connection with the deaths in villages in the Banda and Shahgarh tehsils, the police have named 22 more people as accused, taking the total number of accused in the two cases to 52. Of these, 37 have been arrested so far in raids across Sagar, Morena and Gwalior.
Sagar Superintendent of Police Anurag Sujania said the police had seized materials used to make the liquor, including 11,050 empty bottles, 900 filled bottles, four dyes used to print brand labels, a machine used to seal bottles and large quantities of packaging material.
Two of the main accused, Manish Lodhi and Sidhharth Kushwaha, owners of government-licensed liquor shops who are accused of supplying spurious liquor through their shops, remain absconding. Mr. Sujania said teams were working to arrest the remaining accused.
The police said the accused had been manufacturing counterfeit liquor under the name of 'Sagar Gold', a popular brand in the district, and had used toxic materials to do so in several districts of the State in the past.
"During interrogation of the arrested accused, it came to light that this type of illegal liquor manufacturing activity has been carried out on a large scale in several districts in connivance with other people in the past," Mr. Sujania said. "Since the sole objective of this gang was to make huge profits, they used to make fake and substandard liquor from whatever intoxicating liquid was easily available to them. They used to choose such places where so-called well-off strongmen had dominance, so that the common people could not get information about their activities."
Sagar Additional Superintendent of Police Narendra Solanki said a gang from Morena, headed by key accused Dinesh Shivhare, had been called to manufacture counterfeit liquor at Tatarwara village in Sagar by local accused persons, including Chandrabhan Rajput alias Chandu Raja, described by the police as a Karni Sena leader. Mr. Solanki said Mr. Rajput invited Mr. Shivhare and his associates to make the liquor in his village after Shivanjay Rajput, a 21-year-old accused from Sagar, connected the two.
"Dinesh Shivhare and his associate Devendra Jatav had also consumed the liquor and fallen ill. Their associates admitted them to a private hospital in Sagar. But as soon as they realised that it was their liquor that caused this, they got Dinesh discharged and headed for Morena. He died on the way while Jatav lost his vision," the Additional SP said.
On the basis of information gathered during questioning, police teams were sent to Gwalior and Morena, where six accused, including Dinesh Shivhare's brother Lalit Shivhare, were arrested and materials used for manufacturing the liquor were recovered, he said.
Among those arrested in Morena is Bunty Sharma, who the police said had been involved in making counterfeit liquor earlier. Investigations are continuing, and officials said more arrests were expected.
Deaths from illicit liquor are reported periodically in different parts of the country, where cheap spurious alcohol is often sold to people who cannot afford licensed brands. The two FIRs in the Sagar case are being investigated by the district police.
All those named are accused in the cases and have not been convicted. Under Indian law, they are presumed innocent until proved guilty.
