Excise policy row: Private shops can sell liquor for 2 more months, says Delhi govt circular

The Aam Aadmi Party AAP government in Delhi has decided to allow private shops to sell liquor for two more months provided they deposit the requisite licence fee days after it said that only government shops will sell liquor from August 1In a circular dated July 30 the state government said that licensees who are willing to avail the extension are required to deposit two monthsrsquo fee in advance by August 4Under its new excise policy the Arvind Kejriwalled government had decided to conduct auctions and allow private shops to sell liquor However the policy became embroiled in a bitter political fight between the statersquos ruling AAP and the opposition BJP While the BJP alleged massive corruption in the implementation of the liquor policy the AAP hit back claiming that the opposition party wanted to encourage illegal and spurious tradeAmid all this the Delhi government announced that it would withdraw the policy under which private shops would be shut However on Sunday the state government allowed a further two monthsrsquo extension to private vendsThe move to roll back the new excise policy also came after Delhi Lieutenant Governor VK Saxena recommended a CBI probe into the alleged violations in the implementation of the policyDelhi Deputy Chief Minister Manish Sisodia who also heads the Excise Department claimed that his partyrsquos government brought in a new excise policy to curb graft but central agencies were used to threaten shopkeepers as well as state officials Targeting the BJP he claimed this was done to encourage the sale of illegal as well as spurious liquorldquoWe have decided to withdraw the new policy and ordered liquor be sold only through governmentrun shops We have done this so that no one can sell illegal or spurious liquor in the capital I have ordered the state chief secretary to ensure there is no corruptionrdquo Sisodia had said at a press conferenceSisodia claimed that licenses were issued through open tenders in a transparent manner in the new excise policyHe claimed that before 2021 liquor was sold in Delhi through government shops and alleged there was a lot of corruption ldquoI also carried out some raidsrdquo he saidldquoOur government brought a new policy last year Earlier there used to be some private shops but they would be allotted to near and dear ones We ended this system and brought a new policy We carried out a transparent auction We decided that like earlier there will be only 850 shops The government used to earn a revenue of Rs 6000 crore every year but under the new policy the revenue would have risen to Rs 9500 crorerdquo Sisodia claimedHe said that there were 468 shops functional and many more planned to leave the shopsldquoThey BJP want to create a liquor shortage in Delhi and want to encourage illegal and spurious liquor traderdquo he allegedThe excise policy was passed in chief minister Arvind Kejriwalled Cabinet in the middle of the deadly Covid19 pandemic in 2021The Delhi Policersquos Economic Offences Wing EOW is also conducting a probe into the matter There has also been a faceoff between Delhi Lieutenant Governor VK Saxena and the Delhi governmentrsquos top brass over the new liquor policyThis story has been sourced from a third party syndicated feed agencies Midday accepts no responsibility or liability for its dependability trustworthiness reliability and data of the text Midday managementmiddaycom reserves the sole right to alter delete or remove without notice the content in its absolute discretion for any reason whatsoever