Hyderabad: Due to new rules imposed by the state government and strict vigilance by the Election Commission and also because of the new excise year starting ahead of Assembly elections, dealers have not been able to stock up on liquor. This may affect how much they can purchase during the forthcoming festival season and the subsequent elections.
The sudden dissolution of the Assembly on September 6 the excise year ends in September affected the expectations of the excise department on increase of liquor sales. According to rules, dealers can draw up liquor seven times the licence fee. For excess purchases, they will have to pay 13.5 per cent tax. For example, a dealer with a Rs 1 crore licence fee can purchase liquor up to Rs 7 crore from the TS Beverages Corporation without having to pay 13.5 per cent tax. The excise year ended on September 30, a Sunday. October 2 again was a government holiday to mark Gandhi Jayanti. By the end of the excise year, the dealers had drawn 98 per cent of liquor against their licence fee, and did not purchase extra to avoid paying the 13.5 per cent tax.
Now, the government is expecting the election schedule to be announced around the middle of this month. Once the schedule is announced, the Election Commission enters the picture and dealers will not be able to draw additional quantity of liquor.
Once the poll schedule is announced, the Election Commission imposes restrictions on sales of liquor by the Beverages Corporation. It will decide the quota to be released to dealers based on the withdrawals of the previous month or in the same month of the previous year.
Dealers, however, are focused on the Dasara festival when the consumption of liquor peaks, rather than the elections. Mr M. Kameswara Rao, general secretary of the Association of Liquor and Beer Suppliers, said liquor sales increased by 20 per cent during Dasara, and dealers purchased adequate stocks from the corporation.
He said keeping bulk stocks during elections was not possible as officials may raid godowns and seize the liquor. He said in 2016-17 the average liquor sales were Rs 1,445 crore per month and previous year, the average monthly liquor sales were Rs 1,525 crore per month.
Telangana Wine Dealers Association general secretary D. Venkateswara Rao said it was not possible for dealers to keep bulk stocks of liquor. He said the dealers may draw 5 to 10 per cent more liquor than the monthly withdrawals. There were two problems to draw more liquor one was money and the other was keeping the stock.
Revenue and excise principal secretary Somesh Kumar said there was no increase of liquor sales in view of the elections. He said the dealers had drawn the liquor in the last month as they had drawn in the previous month. However, he said that they will get the data in two or three days.
