Recent seizures of liquor in Haryana, which was being smuggled into Gujarat, indicate that Maharashtra may be emerging as a transit point for moving the brew illegally into the dry state.
Why Maharashtra?
"We have been seizing consignments of liquor manufactured in Haryana," said a senior excise department official. Excise officials said the liquor smugglers chose to enter Gujarat via the busy commercial artery – Mumbai-Ahmedabad highway – as it was impossible to check each vehicle thoroughly at the check posts there. The official added, "Though smuggling the liquor into Gujarat via Maharashtra is circuitous, our state has better roads. The smugglers can buy the brew in bulk and smuggle it in." This in turn, may be inducing smugglers from states like Haryana and Madhya Pradesh.
What did the excise dept seize?
Based on a tip-off, the state excise department seized a huge cache of Indian Made Foreign Liquor (IMFL) worth Rs2.31 crore from a 24-wheel trailer and a truck at Vaijapur in Aurangabad district, which were headed for Gujarat. This modus operandi was unlike the usual route adopted by smugglers, who use smaller vehicles like cars.
They also seized 899 boxes of liquor worth Rs43 lakh manufactured in Haryana in Ahmednagar from two trucks. The consignment was concealed in medical supplies like saline bottles and injections. The department is investigating if the liquor was meant for consumption in Maharashtra, or was being transported to Gujarat. In Dhule, IMFL worth Rs58 lakh manufactured in Haryana was caught enroute Gujarat, while two trucks were caught at Wada in Thane by the police. They added that such consignments had also been nabbed at Nandurbar in 2012.
Systems across the country to market liquor
Maharashtra follows a policy of discouraging liquor consumption through a policy of high prices and low sales and has one of the highest excise duty regimes in India. While southern states have a state-run beverages corporation to market genuine liquor at reasonable prices to consumers, some northern states follow a "theka" (contract) based system to market liquor.
Previous stats of liquor consumption
In 2013-14, IMFL consumption rose by 7.84% to end at 1,615.06 lakh BL in 2013-14 versus 1,497.62 lakh BL in 2012-13. The sales of beer have however headed south at just 2,986.09 lakh BL in 2013-14 down from 3,169.34 in the previous fiscal (-5.78%), while country liquor (CL) too fell to 3,210.97 lakh BL from 3382.99 lakh BL (-5.08%). However, wine consumption rose by 9.71% to end at 50.56 lakh BL from the previous 46.08 lakh BL.
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