Representational purpose.
OPEN AIR restaurants prohibited from serving alcohol in Maharashtra have found a novel way to bypass the law. A probe by the excise department has found that they would get authorities to issue one-day liquor permit at a stretch for days to commercially serve liquor. The one-day licence is meant for serving alcohol at private parties.
While the irregular practice was underway in connivance with officials, the department has now uncovered the nexus.
The department’s probe found the practice was most rampant in Mumbai, where several rooftop restaurants have sprung up in the last few years.
Under the Bombay Foreign Liquor Rules, one-day liquor permit or temporary club licence is solely meant for permitting sale and distribution of alcohol for special function or event.
The probe found that several leading hotels and dining places in south Mumbai and the suburbs would apply for such permits under different names to operate bars that didn’t have a valid licence.
Cracking the whip on all such watering holes, the department has now issued orders, discontinuing issuance of one-day permits in such cases.
When contacted, Principal Secretary (Excise) Valsa Nair-Singh said, “We (the department) had received complaints that commercial establishments were misusing one-day permits to operate bars without valid licences, which prompted the action.”
During the probe, a luxury hotel in Colaba, which has a rooftop diner, was found to have secured one-day permit for 364 days last year. Another “casual-dining” restaurant in Marine Lines would get it issued for four days in a week, while allegedly serving liquor illegally on other days. A rooftop lounge of a global hospitality chain in Central Mumbai has been similarly impacted by the crackdown.
“Mumbai’s existing Development Control regulations do not permit rooftop restaurants. This automatically disqualifies them from applying for a liquor licence. The probe has found that almost all of these have been using the temporary permits to serve alcohol,” said a senior state official.
The Shiv Sena-controlled Mumbai municipality has now proposed to permit such open-air restaurants in a bid to promote the “night-out” culture.
While a ban exists on permitting liquor-serving establishments to function within 75 metres of shrines and educational institutions, the probe has also found instances where one-day permits were repeatedly issued to let such establishments serve alcohol. The government is yet to initiate any action or inquiry in this regard.
Meanwhile, sources confirmed that the liquor lobby has begun exerting political pressure to overturn the action. On September 2, the excise department sleuths raided a suburban rooftop restaurant that had continued to serve alcohol despite being denied a liquor permit.
