THE JHARKHAND STORY NETWORK
Daltonganj, July 1: Only those government retail shops of liquor where the official team will be performing verification of stock, sale proceeds etc, for the purpose of exiting the man power agency so far running the retail shops of liquor, will be closed for business for the time/ hours the verification work will go on.
Other retail shops in the line will not be affected in terms of doing the liquor business.
Excise Officials Adopt Staggered Verification to Avoid Disruption
There are 79 retail shops of liquor in Palamu. If the verification team, five here in Palamu, conducts verification work in five different retail shops of liquor, then in that event, at the point of time of verification, the liquor business will stand closed for only these five shops and not of any remaining 74 other shops at that point of time and hour. There are 23 retail shops of wine in the Latehar district.
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Sources said, “The Excise Secretary Amitabh Kaushal and Excise Commissioner Ravi Shankar and team late Sunday evening decided to have staggered provision of the verification of the retail shops.”
Staggered provision is a set of times, payments etc, arranged so that they do not happen all at the same time.
Sources said the Excise Secretary Amitabh Kaushal and Excise Commissioner Ravi Shankar are going about this disengagement of the private players in the retail business of liquor in the state with abundance of caution and care without jeopardising the financial stakes and outputs.
Overcharging at Liquor Shops a Persistent Concern
Retail shops of liquor in Jharkhand were blatantly accused of selling liquor at a higher price than the MRP (maximum retail price). It was as high as 10 rupees per bottle to 20 rupees per bottle, depending on the quality and brand of the beverages.
Will this malaise be over once the retail shops of liquor come directly under the command of the state government? It’s difficult to vouch for.
Here, an analogy with the civil supplies is to be made. Do ration card holders not get less of food grains every month from the PDS dealers than what is prescribed by the government? It’s true that one wrong or abuse of one department can’t be any suitable excuse for another department if similar or identical malpractice prevails there too.
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Liquor Shops Near Bihar Border Pose Greater Challenges
Retail shops of liquor in Jharkhand sharing borders with Bihar have been found to be more problematic ones than those retail shops situated far away from the border of Bihar.
There is a prohibition in Bihar, and this is one major factor triggering a variety of malpractices in the traffic and transaction of liquor etc, on the Jharkhand soil.
