VIJAYAWADA: Licences will be issued to 4,380 liquor shops in the State under the Excise Policy 2017-19. The licences will be issued through a lottery system with a fixed licence fee, based on the population as per 2011 Census.
Notifications for online registration have already been issued by the respective prohibition and excise superintendents in all the districts.
In accordance with the Apex Court’s directions, it has been was decided not to allow shops within 500m from highways and the licences of the existing ones will cease on March 31. The fresh notification for the period 2017-19 has been issued on March 23 for disposal of the shops falling within 500 m from highways.
As per the Supreme Court order, no shop for the sale of liquor shall be visible from a national or state highway, directly accessible from a national or state highway and should not be located within 500m of the outer edge of the national or state highway or of a service lane along the highway. There will not be any signage and advertisement of the availability of liquors shall be permitted both on national and state highways.
In order to ease the application filing process, declarations in Form A1 and A3 are dispensed with, as it is time-consuming to obtain the declarations and they do not serve any additional security purpose. The two essential conditions contained in the declarations in Form A1 and A3 are incorporated in the application form - A3 (B) itself, binding the licensee by way of application instead of the declarations.
After the notification is issued in the district gazette, the applicants have to first register themselves online, download the application, registration certificate and entry pass, and submit the same to licensing authority with necessary certificates. Drawal of lots shall be conducted shop-wise and only one reserve applicant may be selected for each shop. No areas/localities such as wards/ villages shall be notified, instead the entire mandal/ nagar panchayat/ municipality/ corporation shall be notified as single unit.
The selected applicants may be given the liberty to establish the shops anywhere in the mandal/ nagar panchayat/ municipality/ municipal corporation as the case may be. The shops have to be equipped with the required machinery for reading of Holographic Excise Adhesive Labels (HEAL), to get the licence. Commission of Prohibition and Excise has been given authority to relocate the un-disposed shops anywhere in the state as he deems fit.
The new excise policy makes it clear that no shop shall be permitted on the road from Tirupati Railway Station to Alipiri via RTC bus stand, Leelamahal Circle, Nandi Circle, Vishnu Nivasam, Srinivasam, likewise, from leela mandal - Nandi-Circle-Alipri-SVRR Hospital-SVIMS in Tirupati Municipal Corporation area.
The enforcement wing will be strengthened for effective control of all excise offences including un-authorised sale outlets (belt shops). A command and control centre with sufficient manpower for round-the-clock surveillance would be set up.
Surveillance over the CC cameras installed at distilleries, depots and retail vends, etc, GPRS tracking of all the vehicles carrying IMF/FL consignments from distilleries to depots and further to retail vendors with facility for storage of all the required data and TV footage. The health department has been directed to establish a de-addiction centre in every district in the State.