New revenue plans for country spirit

Statesman News Service

MALDA, 17 SEPT: To earn more revenue by selling country spirit (CS) the district administration has not only urged its authorised sellers to increase 30 per cent sales, but also started to curb ‘fake’ (spurious) country liquor manufacturing units here.

Last night excise department arrested two persons and seized 40 litre rectified spirit in English Bazaar town.

Acting on a tip off, excise officials intercepted an auto rickshaw in which one Samar Ghosh, a resident of Mangalbari under Malda police station, was travelling to deliver rectified spirit for manufacturing fake country liquor.

The district magistrate Mr Sridhar Ghosh said: “A section of people are manufacturing ‘fake country liquor’ in Mangalbari. We have identified the illegal manufacturing unit there. More units are running in Mangalbari and other areas in this district”.

“These unscrupulous traders are selling country liquor at the rate of Rs 20 per bottle in the market (nearly half of its present rate fixed by the government). The consumers cannot make out the difference and buy ‘fake country sprit’ from them. This trade has been hampering business of CS supplied from the government's authorised bottlers”, Mr Ghosh said.

A section of people at Mangalbari sneek in rectified spirit illegally from Bengal-Bihar border in North Dinajpur area and supply across Malda district upto Raghunathganj in Murshidabad regularly.

It may be noted that the district magistrate held a meeting recently with the authorised CS sellers and bottler and asked them to achieve a target of at least 30 percent increase in sales in September this year as compared to September last year.

The selling rate of CS is lower than the previous year because of Ramzan being observed by a large section of people belonging to Muslim community.

The authorised sellers claimed that every year rate of consumption is increasing. Records show that rate is increasing more than 30 per cent than previous records sometimes. Every year rate of consumers is being increased by 10 per cent.

“But the selling rate of Indian made foreign liquor is increasing abnormally. The rate is nearly 130 percent in Malda. The rate of selling of foreign liquor in rural belt is also increasing steadily. The young generation prefers to consume country made foreign liquor than CS”, said Mr Saikat De, one of the leaders of liquor trade in Malda.