RAIPUR: In a significant decision taken by the Chhattisgarh government on Wednesday, there will be a strict monitoring step in place to curb the nuisance of illegal liquor sales across the state.
A cabinet meeting chaired by Chief Minister Vishnu Deo Sai took a decision to introduce new holograms for both domestic and foreign liquor bottles, intended to restrain illegal liquor trade.
“In the cabinet meeting, the state government announced to introduce the new security features on all domestic and foreign liquor bottles in the form of holograms which will be procured from the India Security Press, Nashik. A unique identification will be put in place for each bottle making it easier to detect illegal liquor and deter the unauthorised trade”, said a government spokesperson.
The government hopes that the new initiative besides ensuring the well-being of consumers will also pave the way to boost the state revenues.
The proactive effort by the state is expected to witness stern crackdown on illicit liquor sales in future.
As a commodity, the liquor often led the state to secure high revenue collections but it eventually also became an issue of acrimonious tussle in Chhattisgarh’s political battleground between the Congress and the BJP.
In January this year, the BJP government decided not to open new liquor shops in the state while endorsing the Chhattisgarh Excise Policy 2024-25. Presently, the sale of liquor is done by Chhattisgarh State Marketing Corporation Limited through 750-plus government-owned shops.
The federal probe agency Enforcement Directorate (ED) last year investigating the liquor scam, allegedly occurred during the previous Congress regime, had claimed a prevailing criminal syndicate had operated illegal bribe collections by controlling the high-level management of key state departments and state public sector units in Chhattisgarh. It was then estimated that ‘Proceeds of Crime’ of around Rs 2,161 crore have been generated by the suspects in the alleged scam.
Other major decisions taken by the Sai cabinet included the procurement of paddy from November 14 till January 31, 2025, through both cash and linking methods. This year an estimated 16 million ton of paddy will be procured, the officer said.
The cabinet also approved the ‘Chhattisgarh Rural Drinking Water Operation and Maintenance Rules, 2024’ to ensure the supply of clean drinking water in all gram panchayats.