At least 11 people have died and about 30 were hospitalized after allegedly drinking spurious liquor in Baraj village in the Sagar district of Madhya Pradesh, with the deaths occurring overnight between Saturday and Sunday, September 6, 2026, prompting the district administration to order a magisterial inquiry.
A group of villagers from Baraj drank alcohol on Saturday night and fell ill soon afterward, complaining of nausea and vomiting before they were rushed for treatment, Superintendent of Police Anurag Sujania said. Five of them were declared dead at the hospital, he said, and six others were in serious condition and undergoing treatment.
A case has been registered and the investigation is underway, he added.
How the Deaths Unfolded
The health department’s account traced the toll across two days. According to Devesh Pateriya, the chief medical and health officer, the earliest death came in on Saturday evening, and nine more people died by Sunday morning. Patients were arriving from three to four villages of the district, he said, adding that 25 people reached the civil hospital and were referred on to the medical college in Sagar.
The two accounts were counting different groups of patients at different points in the emergency, and together they sketch a weekend in which the caseload widened from one village to several. In India, the term spurious liquor is used for illicit or adulterated alcohol sold outside the licensed supply chain.
Excise Team Seizes Bottles
Excise department officials arrived in the village and confiscated liquor bottles from a nearby outlet so they could be sent for forensic analysis. The magisterial inquiry ordered by the district administration runs alongside the police case.
That leaves several strands of official work running at once: police have registered a case and opened an investigation, the district administration has ordered its magisterial inquiry, the excise department has sent seized bottles for laboratory testing, and hospital staff have moved the most serious patients from the civil hospital to the medical college in Sagar. The autopsy report, which officials said would settle the cause of death, had not come back.
Chief Minister Orders Immediate Inquiry
Madhya Pradesh Chief Minister Mohan Yadav described the deaths from alcohol consumption in the Banda-Shahgarh area of Sagar district as a tragedy.
“I have directed the minister in-charge and the officials to conduct an immediate inquiry and take strict action,” Yadav said.
The chief minister’s reference to the Banda-Shahgarh area matches the villages named by the district administration. District Collector Pratibha Pal said the deaths followed the consumption of spurious liquor in Nauraj and Googra Khurd villages in the Banda block of Sagar, and that officials had visited the bereaved families and taken stock of the treatment being given to those admitted to the hospital.
Warning to Anyone Who Drank
Pal said the administration had urged anybody who drank the liquor and was showing signs such as vomiting, a headache or fever to go at once to the closest health center for a precautionary checkup. The warning signs officials listed overlap with what the Baraj group reported before they were taken to the hospital, where the first patients complained of nausea and vomiting.
The appeal reached well beyond Baraj. By the health department’s account, the sick were already arriving from three to four villages rather than from a single hamlet, and the district administration named Nauraj and Googra Khurd in the Banda block among the places where residents had died.
The figures released by officials describe the response at different stages. Police accounted for the group from Baraj that was taken to the hospital, five of whom were declared dead, with six others in serious condition. The health department, counting patients arriving from across the block, put the toll at 10 by Sunday morning, with more than 25 people hospitalized.
Deaths from illicit alcohol have surfaced in other states as well. In a separate spurious liquor case in Gujarat, the death toll rose to 13, with three people remaining hospitalized.
Sagar district, in Madhya Pradesh, sits northeast of the state capital, Bhopal. Its rural blocks are served by the civil hospital and the medical college in the district headquarters town, the two facilities where patients were treated and referred over the weekend.
Officials said the autopsy report was awaited, the seized bottles had been sent for forensic testing, and both the criminal investigation and the magisterial inquiry were continuing.
