NEW DELHI: At a time when Delhi government is preparing to present its budget for 2018-19 in the assembly session scheduled from March 16, revenue collections from liquor seem to be going strong and the excise department is hopeful of reaching its target of Rs 4,700 crore this year.
Of the Rs 4,317.5 crore collected so far in 2018, February recorded the highest collection of Rs 580 crore. This is a steep 41.3% increase over Rs 410.5 crore collected in the same period last financial year. The department attributes this exceptional increase to monitoring of the liquor supply network and warnings to the big fish in the liquor trade to follow the rules or face action.
Excise commissioner Amjad Tak said the focus is on strengthening enforcement, crackdown on violators and streamlining the issuance of liquor licences to restaurants and hotels to weed out intermediaries and touts. Currently there are 843 liquor vends, while the total number of licensees is 1,903, which include restaurants and pubs.
In FY 2016-17, excise collections were Rs 4,244.2 crore. The department has already collected Rs 4,317.5 crore till March 11 this fiscal. Tak hopes that as this is the year-end, more people will come forward and pay excise duty making the revenue target manageable.
Tak said that the department is carrying out a drive through the excise intelligence bureau (EIB) to catch violators to bolster revenue collection.
“The department has analysed the pattern of confiscated liquor brought from outside Delhi. It has been found that about 65% is country liquor, a bulk of it belonging to two distilleries. EIB has been specifically asked to gather intelligence about the place from which the consignments from these distilleries are being dispatched to Delhi,” Tak added.
The department has also issued directions to all registered licensees and vends that inventory of liquor showing stock as “sold” should be cleared by March 15 after which penal action will be initiated as per Delhi Excise Act rules along with terms and conditions of their licences.
Besides this, the department has also taken the critical step of plugging loopholes, which includes firming up of special operating procedure (SOP) for liquor licence applications by restaurants and hotels. From now, applicants will be given a licence within one month if the application is complete and fulfils all prerequisites.
As the application process is online, the SOP stipulates that there is no need to visit to the department. In case of queries, applicant can contact the assistant commissioner or deputy commissioner (excise). In case they do not get a proper response from officials, applicants can contact the PS to commissioner (excise). The timeframe for resolution of a query has been set at 2-3 hours.
“Those who face problems in uploading documents or any other technical issues can call the helpdesk for assistance. This will help weed out touts and intermediaries,” Tak asserted.
