Let’s think, for a moment, about the cultural history of drinking. The first reason people consume booze is to relax, taking advantage of its anxiolytic properties. This is the proverbial drink after work - after eight hours of toil, there’s something deeply soothing about a dose of alcohol, which quiets the brain by up-regulating our GABA receptors. And so the stresses of the day seem to fade away - we are given a temporary respite from the recursive complaints of self-consciousness. Since chronic stress is really, really bad for us, finding a substance that can reliably interrupt the stress loop might have medical benefits.

But drinking isn’t just about de-stressing. In fact, the cultural traditions surrounding alcohol tend to emphasize a second, and perhaps even more important, function: SOCIALIZING. For as long people have been fermenting things, they’ve been transforming the yeasty run-off into excuses for big parties. From almost every festival to the Desi Daru of Naraangi and Mausambi, alcohol has always been entangled with our get-togethers. This is for obvious reasons: Alcohol is a delightful social lubricant, a liquid drug that is particularly good at erasing our interpersonal anxieties.

The situation that we are in may slip many of them into anxiety, panic attack that may even lead to depression. Isolating people from not making them have a drink can lead to severe repercussions. In some cases, we have seen people today taking the extreme step by tying a noose and we still have not yet reached the halfway mark in the lockdown calendar.

Requesting the Indian Government (State and Central) to classify this as an essential commodity so that we get access to it. And use this as one of the means to prevent us to slip up. Distribution can be controlled (quota).