Tribal tandas to get mobile liquor sales units

Karnataka’s Excise Department is examining a proposal of door delivery of liquor to individuals who have the required permits.

Speaking after reviewing the progress of the Excise Department in Bengaluru on Wednesday, Excise Minister H. Nagesh, however, added a rider that the proposal could be implemented only if the department gets the consent of the people during public consultations. Also, a host of procedural requirements would have to be fulfilled, including obtaining permission from the Deputy Commissioner of the jurisdiction, he said.

He also announced that the department had decided to commence a system of introducing mobile sales units of liquor in the thandas (colonies) of tribal communities.

“This is to prevent them from consuming spurious liquor,” he said. The first priority would be to convince them to give up alcohol, he added.

Alleging that some of the areas adjoining neighbouring Andhra Pradesh were seeing sales of liquor being illegally brought from that State, he said he had directed officials concerned to prepare an action plan to curb the trend. The minister said people had to travel more than 15 kms in some of the rural areas to reach a liquor shop, while observing that there was a need to open new shops.

Still in Mumbai hangover?

Excise Minister and Independent MLA H. Nagesh appears to be still in the hangover of Mumbai, where he stayed in a hotel along with rebel MLAs from the JD(S) and Congress during the political crisis which finally saw the collapse of the coalition government.

At a press conference in Bengaluru, in reply to a query on whether it had come to his notice that several rural women from northern districts had taken a padayatra to Bengaluru demanding prohibition during the earlier regime, he said he was not aware of either the padayatra or the demand. “They may have taken out the padayatra when I was in Mumbai,” he said. He added that it was not a practical idea to enforce prohibition.

Referring to the fiscal progress, the minister said the Excise Department had achieved a target of 100.98 per cent by collecting revenues to the tune of ₹19,943.93 crore as against the target of ₹19,750 crore during 2018-19.

In 2019-20, the Department had registered revenue collection of ₹9,099.56 crore by August end as against the target of ₹20,950 for the financial year, he said.