KOCHI: Nearly half-a-dozen four-star hotels across the state with enough land have initiated moves to upgrade them into five-star hotels so that they also get bar licence. The existing abkari rules in the state allow sanctioning of bars to five-star hotels only.
Crown Plaza in Kochi is the only five-star hotel that got bar licence in the state since April 1 when the new abkari policy came into being. It’s estimated that there are a total of 34 four-star hotels in the state with bar licence while four have beer parlour licence, taking the total number to 38.
Of the half-a-dozen trying to upgrade into five-star, two each belong to Ernakulam and Thiruvananthapuram districts and one each to Kollam and Kozhikode. “As per the rules, the five-star hotels need to have a minimum of 10 rooms with each having an area of 200 square feet and bathroom of 45 square feet.
So they can continue with their existing rooms while what need to be done is to add 10 more in the new specification. The rooms in the four-star hotels have only an area of 140 square feet and bathroom of 36 square feet,” said a source in the sector.
He said that the cost for upgradation would be anywhere between Rs 2.5 crore and Rs 3 crore. The other requirements for a five-star hotel include having supervisory staff of 50 percent of total staff while the skilled staff should be 60 percent of the total.
They should have a specialty restaurant, dry-cleaning facility, swimming pool, health fitness facility, utility shop, X-Ray machine at the entrance and a conference facility.
