After the apex court ordered closure of bars, pubs, hotels and restaurants within 500m of national and state highways serving liquor from April 1.
After the Supreme Court ordered closure of liquor shop visible and directly accessible from the highways, Niti Aayog CEO Amitabh Kant on Sunday questioned why kill tourism when it creates jobs.
As per the top court's order, licences of existing liquor shops on national and state highways will not be renewed after March 31 and they should be situated within 500 metres of the outer edge of the national or state highway or of the service lane.
Reacting to a story that the top court verdict may hit 1 million jobs, Kant took to micro-blogging site and said, "Tourism creates jobs.Why kill it?."
Meanwhile, over 100 liquor vends, and restaurant and hotel bars located within 500 metres of highways, have been shut down in the last two days following the Supreme Court directive to this effect.
The Excise Department said it launched the drive the Friday (March 31) midnight which will continue on Monday. The Excise Department has formed several teams to ensure all establishments within 500 metres of highways follow the court order.
In its order on December 15 last year, the SC had noted, "The expressways witnessed 4,208 accident cases, 4,229 injured and 1,802 deaths. Figures are also available of the distribution of road accidents by causes during 2014. 1.38 lakh persons were injured in road accidents involving dangerous or careless driving and 42,127 deaths occurred."
However, a bench headed by Chief Justice J S Khehar, however, made it clear that its December 15, 2016 order banning such vends within 500 metres of highways shall remain operative for areas other than specified in today's order.
It clarified that licences given to liquor vendors prior to the December 15 judgement would be valid up to September 30 this year.
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