Today, India celebrates its Independence Day. We do not, however, have the liberty to celebrate with a cold lager. Independence Day, like Republic Day and Gandhi's birth anniversary, is a "dry day": bars and off-licences are shut and there is no way to procure alcohol legally.
It doesn't end there. Each state has its own laundry list of days when the sale of alcohol is banned. And in every constituency in India, the 48 hours before any election are alcohol-free. So is the day that votes are counted. When my MP died a few years ago, a byelection meant that bars in my neighbourhood were shut but the drink flowed freely one mile south.
The Indian state has never been particularly keen on alcohol, partly thanks to Gandhi's distaste for the stuff, along with meat and sex. In 1937, when the Indian National Congress came to power, they instituted a policy of prohibition. In 1939, Britain signed up India to the second world war without consultation. The government resigned, the Brits took over again and they promptly abolished prohibition. When India gained independence in 1947, prohibition was encouraged but it was left to the discretion of individual states.
Maharashtra, of which Mumbai is the capital, went dry in 1949. The controls were loosened somewhat in 1963 and all but abolished by the end of the 1970s. Yet, Maharashtra continues to be, in theory, a prohibition state. To get merry in Maharashtra, you need to obtain a permit from the government, which states, and I quote: "I hereby declare that I continue to require foreign liquor and country liquor for preservation and maintenance of my health." An alcoholic, in short. Several other states – including Andhra Pradesh, Haryana and Kerala – attempted and eventually abandoned prohibition. Gandhi's birth state of Gujarat is the only one that continues to be wholly dry, but Gujaratis are among the biggest drinkers.
It is tempting to blame religion for India's attitude towards alcohol or to ascribe it to the values of our founding fathers. But Hinduism, unlike Islam or Sikhism, has little problem with intoxication. Nor could our leaders institute these policies without public support.
Like Britain, the reasons for our continuing experiments with laying off the booze are more societal. Unlike Britain, where a fondness for public inebriation appears to be a prerequisite for university graduation and is a constant source of tabloid indignation, India's problems with alcohol tend to be largely private. Men, often working-class or rural (though by no means necessarily either), drink too much, do no work and beat up their wives. Rare is the Indian village where no woman has suffered abuse on account of her drunk husband. Few middle-class families haven't had maids supporting their abusive, alcoholic husbands. And because of India's baffling excise laws, spirits tend to be cheaper than lower-alcohol content beer or wine so everyone from college students to HR managers get hammered on standard measures of 30ml (called a small; for wimps) or 60ml (a large; for real men). Unsurprisingly, it is women's groups that are the loudest advocates of prohibition.
There is no denying that alcohol is a problem in India. But banning booze outright has been proven not to work. Apart from converting what could be taxes for the government into profits for bootleggers (as in Gujarat), there is also the problem of illegal brews that often blind or kill their clients .
And declaring certain days dry is tokenism of the most pointless kind. On Saturday, handwritten signs will go up outside off-licences across the country warning patrons that they have fewer than 24 hours in which to stock up. At my father's house in Mumbai, the friendly neighbourhood offy will call to remind him. On the day itself, many bars will continue trading through back windows. And if you're new in town, ask your cabbie with a nudge and wink. Every year it's the same charade.
India is a large and difficult country to govern. It is one whose leaders follow the colonial example and speak to their citizens from on high, proscribing as they see fit. (We were the first to ban Salman Rushdie's Satanic Verses, which continues to be unavailable). But in the 21st century, when India is striving to be taken seriously as a grown-up nation in the international community, it must start by treating its own citizens as responsible adults.