Bars, wine shops to remain open till 10pm

Nagpur: Collector Ravindra Thakare issued an order on Friday permitting bars and wine shops in the district to remain open till 10pm. This has given some relief to the retail liquor industry.
Earlier, bars and wine shops were asked to close down at 9pm. This created problems for bar owners as their business usually begins after 8pm.
The state tourism department had permitted bars and restaurants to remain open till 10pm following guidelines issued under Mission Begin Again. The excise commissioner allowed these timings from Thursday. On Friday, the excise department put a proposal before the collector on the basis of these orders to extend closure timings till 10pm.
According to the collector’s order, bars and clubs serving liquor can remain open from 11.30am to 10pm. The timings for wine shops are 10am to 10pm while country liquor shops can do business between 8am and 10pm.
Hotelier Tejinder Singh Renu said that it was a welcome development. “We will ask the bar and restaurant owners to rigorously follow the standard operating procedure. We hope this will prompt the government to extend the closure timings further,” he said.
Sameer Sharma, a bar owner, said that ideally the closure timings for bars should be 11.30pm. “Only then we will be able to do full business and pay taxes to the government,” he said.
Some districts like Buldhana still have impractical closure timings for bars. The collector there has ordered the bars to close down at 7pm, which has led to only 30% restaurants starting operations.
Sources in Buldhana excise department said that a proposal had been put up before the collector to extend the timings till 10pm. “The collector is likely to approve this order on Saturday morning,” said an officer.