Two ahatas for every six liquor vends

GURUGRAM: To stop people from drinking in the open, particularly outside roadside vends, the state government has made two ahatas (small restaurant for drinkers) mandatory for every six liquor shops in the city, under its new excise policy. The policy comes into effect from April 1.
The aim of an ahata outside a liquor outlet in the state is to “prevent rowdy and drunken behaviour in public”, an excise official said.

As per the new policy, the licence fee for an ahata will be charged at 0.8% of the zone fee with a minimum of Rs 4 lakh as compared to 0.5% of the zone fees last year, and Rs 2 lakh as minimum.

However, the excise official clarified that the price of opening additional ahatas has been reduced to 0.4% of the zone fees. The policy however, has not changed with regard to number of vends in a zone, which will be six vends and two sub-vends. Gurugram has a total of 19 zones in the east district and 22 in the west district.

On the request of a Japanese company, the state government has also decided to allow pub licences (exclusively for wine and beer sales) in industrial model township, Manesar.

Though the state government has retained the much-debated “single vendor” policy for Foreign Liquor under the excise policy 2018-19, it has hiked the reserve price for bidding from Rs 50 crore in the current fiscal to Rs 62.5 crore in the next financial year.

Under the policy, the licence price for selling Indian-made Foreign Liquor (IMFL) has also gone up from Rs 1.25 crore this year to Rs 1.60 crore for the next financial year. This price was Rs 50 lakh in 2016-17. “The fee for this category has jumped 220% in the last two years and will make industrial supplies expensive at the current price,” said an industry expert.

The cost of getting a licence for a microbrewery has also gone up from Rs 10 lakh to Rs 12 lakh, and the security deposit has also been hiked from Rs 2 lakh to Rs 3 lakh. “Since Delhi has also opened up licences for microbreweries, this will create competition. The city businessmen will have to sustain sales to match up,” he said.

The excise duty and permit fee has been increased across the board for beers as well as imported foreign liquors with creation of additional slabs. The highest increase has been in the case of draught liquor which has gone up from Rs 36 in the previous policy to Rs 40 in this one, and the permit fees has gone up from Rs 2 this financial year to Rs 5 in the next fiscal.

While the license fees for bar licenses have remained the same, setting up an additional point of sale within an existing licence has been made costly, from 15% of the licence fee in this financial year’s policy to 20% in the next fiscal.

Bar owners have also expressed discontent over the increase in fees to extend the opening time for an additional hour. “From Rs 8 lakh, the extension time fees has gone up to Rs 10 lakh annually. This is very high, even compared to Delhi. This is hard hitting on our pockets as there have already been several hikes for sellers of imported liquor, which is most in demand,” said a Gurugram-based bar owner.