Indian fishermen drink more to drown their sorrow

It's not even 11 in the morning and dozens of fishermen have started arriving at a state-run liquor shop in southern India for an early binge.

They seem to be in a trance as they walk to the counter, wearing crumpled shirts and sarongs, some with heads shaved and stubble on their chin, buy a small bottle of liquor - whisky, rum, brandy, anything the salesman gives them - and enter a filthy, dingy restaurant next door that serves as a bar.

Inside are eight or 10 tables and groups of two or three men stand around them, gulping their spirits from flimsy plastic cups. Most do not dilute their drink, some mix soft drinks while a few make cocktails of beer and hard liquor.

All have lost more than one immediate family member to the tsunami.

"I drink to forget," said V. Rethinavel, 58, a fisherman from the outskirts of Nagapattinam town, whose 11-year-old son, 18-year-old daughter, brother and sister-in-law were killed by the December 26 Indian Ocean tsunami.

"They were buried in mass graves. We did not even see the bodies properly. Every time I returned from the sea, my children would come to me shouting appa, appa (daddy, daddy)," said Mr Rethinavel, closing his small, bloodshot eyes.

"Now who will call me appa?" Devastated by the enormity of their loss, fishermen in and around Nagapattinam, India's worst-hit district with more than 6,000 deaths, have drastically increased drinking, liquor store workers and voluntary groups said.

For many, whose houses were swept away by the giant waves and all property lost, an emergency cash relief of 4,000 rupees ($90) given by the government has come in handy.

Much of the money is going back to the government because liquor distribution is a state monopoly in the southern state of Tamil Nadu, where Nagapattinam is located.

"Some come at eight in the morning when the shop opens," said Murugesan, who works at one Nagapattinam liquor shop where daily sales have doubled since the tsunami.

"All businesses in Nagapattinam were closed for several days after the tsunami but these fellows went to the district administrator and demanded liquor shops be opened," he said.

While many like Mr Rethinavel drink to drown their sorrow, others like Ravi, 24, end up at bars in the morning because fishing has yet to resume. They need to kill time and government relief has brought easy cash.

"What does one do when there is no work and no home?" asked Ravi, drinking straight from a large bottle of beer at a bar by the highway near Nagore, on the outskirts of Nagapattinam.

Although fishermen in the region drank regularly even before the tsunami, particularly after they came back from the sea, the sharp rise in sales after the disaster was alarming, voluntary groups and aid workers said.

"It looks like a small issue now, but it can blow up into a major problem and create conflicts in families and villages," said M. Krishnakumar, project director of Avvai Village Welfare Society, a local voluntary group.

"In the long term these people could become dependent on alcohol and stop being productive," he said.

Authorities have been asked to stop liquor sales for a month or so, he added.

"That is easier said than done," said a senior state government officer. "There are many complexities involved and we will try to address this."