Anna Nagar residents oppose TASMAC unit

CHENNAI: Residents of various colonies in the Anna Nagar West Extension (Phase –II) and its surrounding areas like Elango Nagar and Murthi Nagar are upset over the government decision to set up a TASMAC shop in their area.This is the government’s second such attempt in the last eight years to open a liquor shop in the highly residential locality.According to residents, in 2003, TASMAC for the first time opened its shop in Kannappar Street in the Officers’ Colony Extension area. But it had to wind up the shop within a month’s time after the residents welfare associations and members of a  school for the hearing and voice impaired (located adjacent to the shop) objected to its presence.After a gap of eight years, residents in the locality are uniting once again to stop the inauguration of a liquor shop in the colony.Talking to City Express, Ganapathi, a resident of Elango Nagar, said, “We are opposing the move wholeheartedly as the presence of a TASMAC shop inside the colony will spoil the tranquility of all the residential colonies in the area.”The proposal to set up such a liquor shop is against the law as a school for the differently abled has been functioning near the (proposed) site for more than a decade and the shop is just a few metres away, said Arunagiri, a resident of Murthi Nagar.“A rule of the Tamil Nadu Liquor Retail Vending (in Shops and Bars) Rules 2003 says that no liquor shop shall be established within a 100-metre radius of places of worship and educational institutions. However, we do not actually know how the government has allowed it, she added.