New Liquor Policy: Health First Priority, Reduce Alcohol Content, Says AP CM
Naidu said the new policy was formulated on the basis of a report submitted by the Group of Ministers and also on the proposals from stakeholders.
Vijayawada: As the Andhra Pradesh government is implementing a new bar policy a month hence, Chief Minister N. Chandrababu Naidu has stressed that it should give priority to health and not money.
“There is a need to reduce alcohol content in the liquor to protect the health of consumers,” he said at a review meeting he held here on Monday to discuss the new bar policy with ministers Kollu Ravindra and Kondapalli Srinivas and officials from the excise department.
The CM said the new policy was formulated on the basis of a report submitted by the Group of Ministers and also on the proposals from stakeholders.
“There are 840 bars in AP. Permission would be given for setting up more bars through a draw-of-lot. The group of ministers proposed a licence fee structure for bars. In an area where the population is less than 50,000, the fee would be Rs.35 lakh,” he said.
In cases where the population is below five lakh, the licence fee would be 155 lakh. Where the population is above five lakh, the licence would be Rs.75 lakh.
The excise department was expecting to earn Rs.700 crore through the application and licence fees in the new bar policy and fixed a norm of getting a minimum of four applications for allotment of each bar.
Naidu wanted that 10 per cent of the total number of bars be allotted to the communities engaged in toddy tapping (Geetha Kulalu), similar to the allotment of 10 per cent of the shops for them in the AP’s liquor policy that was announced earlier.
The excise officials explained to the CM that a reduction of liquor price, availability of all brands of liquor and providing quality liquor helped increase the liquor sales in AP while there was marginal rise in liquor sales also in the areas bordering the neighbouring states. However, the liquor sales had seen a dip in the neighbouring states.
They recalled how the liquor sales dipped in AP during the previous government’s term due to high price and non availability of quality brands in the state. By the end of September, all districts in AP would be declared free from illicitly distilled liquor, they told the CM.
