Liquor busts: Excise dept’s revenue up by 25% in 2022

Ludhiana: In a major development, the city’s excise department has registered approximately 25% increase in its collections. The revenue earned by department in 2022 up to December is Rs 805.49 crore, as against the Rs 644.47 crore earned during the same interval in 2021.
The increase is an outcome of the strictness and vigil increased by the department in the past few months, when record number of operations against illicit liquor smuggling were held. In the last three months, the excise had registered 37 cases of breach, in which a penalty of Rs 23 lakh was imposed.
Paramjit Singh, deputy commissioner (excise), Patiala Zone said, “Since April 2022 till December 31, 2022 our teams conducted 1,413 raids in Ludhiana East and West. During this period, 5,866 bottles of Punjab medium liquor, 15,155 bottles of Indian-made foreign liquor, and 6,617 bottles of beer have been seized by our teams. As far as our operations against illicit liquor manufacturing are concerned, we have seized more than 21,20,000 litres of lahan during April-December 2022. Besides, 139 FIRs have also been registered and 131 arrests were made by us under various offences.”
Singh further added, “We have also conducted one of the biggest search and seizure one-day operation in the state, in which our teams on December 17 recovered 3.3 lakh litres of lahan from near Sidhwan Bet. Prior to this, our teams had also seized and destroyed lakhs of litres of lahan in different operations, while several other significant search and destroy operations were also conducted by our teams. In another big operation during the month of November, our teams had conducted a raid near GNE College, and more than 1,000 cases of beer, wine, scotch etc, which was illegally stored there, were seized by us.”
Singh claimed these operations spoke about determination and commitment of the excise department’s officials against illicit liquor manufacturing. He said they were certain to do more this year.