The police have refuted rumours that the toxicology reports of the seized liquor had already arrived. "We are awaiting results of contents in the seized alcohol from the forensic laboratory. We are waiting to corroborate those results with that of the fatal level of methanol found in the victims' bodies," said Dhananjay Kulkarni, deputy commissioner of police, Mumbai.
While it has been ascertained that poisonous methanol was found in the organs of the deceased in the Malvani hooch tragedy, which has left over a hundred dead so far, scientists are now in the process of testing the seized liquor for the presence of toxic material.
The police have refuted rumours that the toxicology reports of the seized liquor had already arrived. "We are awaiting results of contents in the seized alcohol from the forensic laboratory. We are waiting to corroborate those results with that of the fatal level of methanol found in the victims' bodies," said Dhananjay Kulkarni, deputy commissioner of police, Mumbai.
The police had seized over a thousand litres of spurious alcohol packed in eight drums and a few cans from the Malvani neighbourhood after the tragedy struck on June 19. Nineteen samples of seized liquor have been packed in glass bottles and sent to the Forensic Sciences Laboratory (FSL) in Kalina for analysis. Chemical analysis and gas chromatography tests will be run on the seized alcohol samples to ascertain its contents, said FSL officials.
"The seized liquor contents will be analysed for presence of methanol, ethanol and denaturants, if any," said an official.
Scientists said the production facilities for making ethanol, which is the raw material for good alcohol, are sugar factories. Methanol, which comes under the Maharashtra Poison Rules, 1972, is manufactured in separate industrial factory set-ups. Under the Bombay Prohibition Act, 1949, it is a derivative of petroleum and is not meant to be added in alcohol.
"The contents will also be tested for denaturants, which are added to ethanol while transporting it from sugar factories to liquor production factories. Denaturants, like formaldehyde, other bittering agents and dyes are added to raw material ethanol to render it temporarily unfit for human consumption, so it may not be misused during transport. However, the hooch operators even siphon off denatured ethanol at times to make bootlegged liquor," said an FSL official. "The excise department has jurisdiction over regulating the sale and transport of ethanol. In spite of this, denatured ethanol is smuggled from sugar factories for making hooch."
Methanol on the other end, which was detected in viscera, blood and urine samples of the deceased and survivors, is a far more dangerous substance, consumption of which between 60 and 240ml can cause death.
"Methanol is used as a solvent in industries and labs. Its production, manufacture and supply is not regulated by the excise department. After the contents of the seized liquor are revealed, it will have to be investigated as to where it may have been procured or smuggled from, depending upon the nature of the contents revealed," said the FSL official.
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