State Control on Liquor Spoils Party for a Tourist Town

Or somebody who used to spend the entire month of May playing cricket, Bertie is sheepish to admit that the Mumbai heat now gets to him.

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His colleague who tracks public holidays like a hawk informed him that after Labour Day, there was no public holiday till Independence Day in August. This and the muggy weather convinced Bertie that a quick dash to a cooler clime was justified. He fired up his favourite AI tool to search for places within a six-hour radius and an assured temperature of less than 30 degrees Celsius. In consultation with the missus, he zeroed in on Ooty: a place he hadn't visited in over 30 years and the only memory he had of it was a faded photograph of him astride a pony.

Ooty lived up to its weather promise and then some. Unlike the hill stations up north, Bertie was pleasantly surprised that the place was not choc-a-bloc with tourists despite the Labour Day holiday. Also, the tourists there were largely the family crowd. Unlike Goa, the food prices at restaurants were not exorbitant and the cab drivers were polite not just to passengers but also each other. Now, Bertie may be on vacation, but his curious mind never takes a break. When he sees something with sound fundamentals trading cheap, he feels compelled to investigate.