No rush at liquor shops in Punjab, vends at many places remain shut

Liquor shops reopened in some parts of Punjab on Thursday after more than 40 days but not many people turned up, which some vendors blamed on loss of jobs due to the coronavirus lockdown and reverse migration of workers from other states.

Contractors in several districts kept their liquor shops shut, seeking a review of the 2020-21 Excise Policy.

While liquor shops opened in Mohali, Rupnagar, Ferozepur, Phagwara among other districts, contractors said they did not open their vends in Ludhiana, Hoshiarpur, Jalandhar, Nawanshahr and some other parts of the state.

The state government has allowed shops including liquor vends to open from Thursday between 7 and 3 pm which is the curfew relaxation timing. The Punjab Excise and Taxation Department had allowed home delivery of liquor.

Unlike in Chandigarh, where people had lined up for buying liquor outside shops a few days ago, there was no rush at vends in other parts of the states wherever they opened.

In Mohali, one of the liquor contractors who opened his shop in the morning, said there were very few buyers.

He said most of the people living in Mohali had bought liquor from Chandigarh where vends opened on May 4. "I thought a large number of people will come to buy liquor but it did not happen," he claimed.

In Phagwara also,there was no rush outside liquor vends which reopened after a long time due to COVID-induced curfew/lockdown. Hardly a few people were standing outside shops to buy liquor.

Vendors said the liquor sale was hit as many buyers were either without salaries or have lost their jobs during the lockdown, while a big chunk of migrant labourers had already left for their home states.

Sanjeev Bhandari, one of the leading liquor contractors in Phagwara, said they will not be able to do home delivery of liquor because of unavailability of labour.

"We are doing counter sales by observing social distancing norms," he said.

In Rupnagar also, liquor contractors reported low sales on the first day and said not even a single order for home delivery was booked.

The Amritsar district administration did not give permission for opening the liquor vends in the city.

Meanwhile, liquor vendors sought revision of excise policy and demanded from the government to charge a fee on the basis of liquor sales as against the fixed quota system at present.

"There should be modification in the excise policy and the condition of quota be withdrawn. Excise fee should be deposited by the licensee as per the actual sales, said Ludhiana-based liquor contractor Nandi Gupta.

Liquor vendors also pointed out that people who accounted for bulk of liquor sales did not have capacity to buy liquor because of loss of jobs and other financial constraints.

"Due to loss of jobs, the poor strata of society would not be able to purchase and consume alcohol due to present prevailing circumstances and there is going to be heavy loss in sales, even more than 50 per cent," they said.

They were also against the home delivery system, saying it will increase their cost of operations.

They also said there were chances of the spread of coronavirus if any of the delivery boys contracted the infection as happened in case of pizza delivery boy in Delhi.