Making industrial methanol bitter and blue was no answer to a hooch tragedy, and the rules fell under Articles 14 and 19
Justices J.B. Pardiwala and K. Vinod Chandran struck down Rules 18A and 18B of the Maharashtra Poisons Rules and sent fifteen regulatory suggestions to every High Court and Chief Secretary.
After a hooch tragedy, the Maharashtra administration decided to make methanol both unpalatable and unrecognisable: industrial methanol would have to be adulterated with a bitterant and a colourant. Chemical manufacturers and the Indian Chemical Council challenged the rules that required it. On 18 September 2026 the Supreme Court held that Rules 18A and 18B of the Maharashtra Poisons Rules violate Article 14 and Article 19(1)(g) of the Constitution and allowed the petitions, while setting out a list of measures it considers more likely to work — and directing that the judgment reach every High Court and every Chief Secretary in the country.
What the rules required, and who objected
Two writ petitions and a connected civil appeal raised the same issue and were heard together. The petitioners in the first petition and the appellant in the appeal, a chemical manufacturer and the Indian Chemical Council, challenged the requirement that methanol be dosed with a bitterant and a colourant before it could be sold or moved. The State of Maharashtra defended the rules as a response to deaths caused by the consumption of illicit liquor adulterated with methanol.
The issue the Court framed for itself was narrow and constitutional: whether Rules 18A and 18B of the Maharashtra Poisons Rules could be said to be arbitrary, disproportionate and unreasonable.
Why bitterness was the wrong lever
The Court's answer starts from what the measure is actually aimed at. Forced temperance, it said, is no solution for alcoholism, and for a person in the grip of craving neither taste nor colour matters. Adulterating methanol with a bitterant and a colourant would not quell that craving. What it would do is fall on the industry that uses methanol as a raw material and a solvent, which the judgment describes as the death knell of an industry and an exercise in missing the woods for the trees.
If the object is to make methanol unavailable to those who would divert it into illicit liquor, the Court said, the route runs through stricter regulatory measures for transportation and storage of the kind the excise laws already contemplate — controlling where the chemical goes and who accounts for it, rather than changing what it tastes like in every drum sold to a lawful user.
The suggestions the Court attached
Having struck the rules down, the Bench set out a series of measures under the heading of meaningful suggestions. On the supply side, containers and tankers used for the transport and storage of methanol should be sealed in a tamper-evident manner at the point of dispatch, so that they cannot be opened and no residual quantity can be siphoned off or left unaccounted for at the bottom of the container, except by authorised personnel of the consuming industry at the point of receipt, with the seal number and its condition recorded both at dispatch and at receipt.
On the health side, the Court said the State Health and Family Welfare Department should have a comprehensive policy and a specialised cell to handle liquor tragedies. Where there are large-scale casualties, public hospitals are in complete chaos in the face of a sudden emergency, and past experience shows they are hardly equipped with the specialised medicines or equipment such emergencies require; a disaster management system and policy should be in place for them.
The remaining suggestions address demand. The State Government should increase the number of de-addiction centres and fully operationalise those that already exist, and those centres should be given the additional responsibility of reaching out to families affected by liquor. Because consumption often breaks up families, there should be family counselling centres in each local area, especially for families suffering in silence. State Governments and non-governmental organisations should run awareness campaigns about the prohibition law and its implementation, since the public's cooperation in informing law enforcement agencies is central to enforcing it.
Who has to do the work
The Court was clear that directions from a court are not the operative part of the answer. In matters of this nature, it said, although the Court may issue various directions, it is the police machinery that should rise to the occasion and see to it that the provisions of the Act governing the regulation of alcohol are implemented strictly and effectively.
Order
The Court held that the impugned rules are violative of Article 14 and Article 19(1)(g) of the Constitution. The writ petitions were allowed in those terms and the civil appeal disposed of accordingly, with pending applications disposed of. The Registry was directed to forward one copy of the judgment to each High Court and one copy to each of the Chief Secretaries of the respective States.