Govt proposes liquor at doorstep & more

Govt proposes liquor at doorstep & more
KOTA NEELIMA

NEW DELHI, FEB 9: As part of its new excise policy, finalised after a gap of almost two years, the Delhi government is set to introduce home delivery of liquor in the Capital and revise the provision of having liquor vends near the sites scheduled in the earlier policy.

The last time a reformulation was attempted, during the tenure of the Bharatiya Janata Party, the process was spiked because the proposal to allow liquor vends near some religious places raised a furore within the BJP. Wiser from experience and treading carefully this time, the Congress Government in Delhi is all set to make major policy changes, to be implemented from April 1. It will be discussed by the cabinet in another week's time.

One of the changes is revising the plan which says that no liquor vends should situated within a radius of 75 m from five specific sites places of worship, educational institutions, hospitals, Harijan bastis and industrial establishments. While leaving places of worship within the policy, it is beingproposed that the other four scheduled sites need not be exempted from setting up of liquor vends within 75 m of their radius.

``These are archaic plans and need to be revised once in every while. The idea is not to follow something blindly, but to change it according to the changing needs of the state,'' explains a senior official of the Excise Department.

The second most important decision is to introduce home delivery of liquor. All vends have a L-2 licence which is a licence for selling liquor not to be consumed on the premises. And all such vends are under the government. When the new policy comes into effect, the Delhi Government officials incharge and, perhaps those of the Municipal Corporation of Delhi, would take orders on phone and supply liquor to the doorstep of the consumer. In doing so, the Government would not levy a service charge and the delivery profits will remain with the liquor vending authority. The third new step would be to raise the limit of liquor or beer that can be kept athome. Presently, consumers are allowed to keep two bottles of liquor and six bottles of beer. The upper limit of the number of bottles that can be stored is yet to be decided.

The fourth proposal is to open liquor vends in hotels, beginning with the hotels under the Indian Tourism Development Corporation (ITDC) which would include hotels like the Ashok and Kanishka in the Capital.

The fifth proposal is to allow dedicated vends where all names of liquor manufactured by a particular brand can be sold under one roof. The sixth proposal is to begin bar coding of the bottles where the name, quality and price of the liquor being sold can automated through a series of bar codes, thus keeping a check of smuggling and misappropriation of sales in the vends. Also, it is proposed to bring down the number of dry days from the present 21 and make available all brands of liquor in the Capital from March 1.

Finally, the policy earmarks 40 new vends on the Delhi-Haryana border. Explains the excise official, ``We arelosing about Rs 400 crore due to the smuggling of liquor from Haryana and Uttar Pradesh. It happens when the liquor from these states flows into the local market and is even sold at the various Government's liquor vends.'' ``The primary emphasis of the new policy is to check this smuggling, which will raise our excise revenue by at least Rs 80 crore. Also, wer are stressing on consumer satisfaction,'' says the official.