HYDERABAD: More than a month after the city witnessed reportedly its biggest drug bust, pubs and restaurants, especially those in the IT corridor, are shutting their businesses early, allegedly owing to the mounting pressure from cops. Not just that, pubs managements are keeping a strict vigil on their customers.
Several pubs in the city were recently served notices by the SIT of Prohibition and Excise department for their alleged involvement in drug racket functioning in the city. The managers and owners are feeling the heat because of the drug bust and seem to be in no mood to risk their liquor licenses. As a result, hundreds of techies who visit pubs during late night hours are not being served alcohol or food.
Sounds & Spirits, a pub in Madhapur, has witnessed a dip in the footfall, especially in the wake of the recent drug bust in the city.
“Though the corporate crowd prefers the late night timing, we have to oblige with the police and hence the footfall has reduced. Initially, we used to shut down at 12:30 am, but now it has come down to 11:30 pm,” said Surya Teja, working partner. “It is sure to take another two months for things to settle down and for people to adjust to the change in timings. The positive aspect to this is rash driving and drunk & drive cases are certain to reduce,” said Anthony Lawrence, General Manager of 10 Downing Street. Meanwhile, police officials said timings of bars, pubs, and restaurants were always under scanner and there was no extra vigilantism because of drug bust.
“12 pm is closing time for pubs and 1 am for restaurants and it has been same for a long time. There are a lot of bars and restaurants in Madhapur area and there were no incidents of drug use in recent times,” said R Kalinga Rao, inspector, Madhapur. Curbing drug use in pubs, not in our control Though several pubs in the city got away with a warning and a few arrests were made, there still are many pubs which operate as ‘drug hubs’ in the city.
PS Pranesh, manager of Xtreme Sports bar said that everybody knows that pubs are drug hubs, but are not foolish to let people do drugs. “Pubs are drug hubs everywhere, it is not any different here. But, we cannot risk our business at the cost of some youth wanting to do drugs on our premises at least with our knowledge,” he said. We take no chance in asking our customers to leave if any suspicious behaviour is noticed, he added. “Just yesterday a youth, after consuming beer, went into the wash room and after coming back behaved suspiciously. We immediately issued a bill and asked him to leave,” Pranesh said.