KUTTIPPURAM: Eighteen people, including a woman, were killed and a dozen others hospitalised after they consumed poisoned toddy at different parts of the Malappuram district since Sunday afternoon. Most of them died on Monday morning. Eleven of the victims are Malayalis. Seven of the victims belonged to Tamil Nadu. Ten persons have been admitted to various hospitals at Malappuram and Kozhikode districts. The victims had reportedly consumed toddy from shops at Kuttippuram, Perasannur, Alathiyur, Pullooral, and Vaniyambalam. The presence of methyl alcohol in toddy was suspected to have caused the deaths. The toddy supplied in those shops reportedly came from Chittoor. Those died include Balan (68) from Kuttipuram, Subramanyan (50) from Karat, Chathukkutty (48) from Thirur, John Mohandas (42) from Kodakkal, Navaz (28) from Thekkepoottur in Thiruvananthapuram, Kumaran (45) from Vandoor, his wife Meenakshi (42), Sethumadhavan (55) from Vandoor, Shiju (27) from Edappal, and Tamil Nadu residents Janashekharan (42), Nithin (25), Chinnaswamy (60), Rajeev (42), Velayudhan (40), Prakash (32) and Polakkallu Dasan (50). One person has not been identified yet. His body is kept at mortuary in Kozhikode Medical College Hospital. The manager of the toddy shop responsible for the tragedy, Dravyan (44) from Pattambi, owners Balan from Perasannur and Unnikrishnan from Kuttipuram have been taken to police custody. It was on Monday morning that the dead bodies of two persons who consumed poisoned toddy were found at railway platform. Later, three bodies were also found near the toddy shop. All toddy shops in the district were closed on Monday following an order by District Superintendent of Police K. Sethuraman. Home Minister Kodiyeri Balakrishnan visited Kuttippuram and Tirur on Monday. He said murder charges would be framed against the guilty if the deaths were confirmed to be due to spurious liquor. He said the government would consider giving compensation to the victims. Minister for Excise P.K. Gurudasan said that stringent action would be taken against the guilty. "We have to wait till the postmortem. The guilty will be punished for homicide,' he said. Meanwhile, KPCC president Ramesh Chennithala alleged that illicit liquor was "flowing freely" in the state and demanded a judicial inquiry. Accusing the LDF Government of failure to control liquor and spirit mafia, opposition leader Oommen Chandy also demanded a judicial inquiry.