E-Paper
First-ever Excise Investors’ Summit in Lucknow today
Lucknow's Excise Investor Summit on Wednesday aims to boost investments in UP's alcohol industry, contributing ₹56,000 crore to the state’s GDP.
Prefer HTon Google
letters@htlive.com
Lucknow: The state excise department will be holding a first-of-its-kind Excise Investor Summit at Indira Gandhi Pratishthan here on Wednesday. It has partnered with Invest UP to attract more investment in the state.
Minister of state (Excise and Prohibition) Nitin Agarwal will be inaugurating the Summit around 10 am followed by an address by excise commissioner Dr Adarsh Singh. A report on the alcoholic beverage industry in Uttar Pradesh by ISWAI (International Spirits and Wines Association of India, will be released by the minister on the occasion.
According to the report, UP’s alcoholic beverages industry contributed around ₹56,000 crore (FY 2023-24) in market revenue, which is equivalent to 2.4% of the state’s GDP.
Post the launch, there will be sessions on the export promotion of alcohol industry in the state. The next session will be on breweries, distilleries and local fruit-based wines, followed by a session on government policies. The last session will be on success stories from the industry.
The day-long Summit will see participation from wine-making and beer-making MSME units, ENA (Extra Neutral Alcohol) and Grain-ENA manufacturers, related plant and equipment manufacturers, industry associations and interest groups and alcoholic beverages manufacturing companies.
Speaking to the press on Tuesday at his official residence here, the minister said, “In the past, a total of 142 proposals were received for setting up alcohol based industries in the state through Invest UP, against which 135 MoUs were signed.. The said 135 MoUs involved an investment of Rs. 39,479.39 crore and creation of 73,524 employment opportunities. Out of the said 135 cases, after the purchase of land by 46 investors, the relevant documents were made available on the Invest UP portal (GBC-ready cases).”
“An investment of Rs. 788.73 crore is being made in 46 GBC-ready projects. Out of the said 46 cases, 19 units have been established and are operational…” he added.
On the issue of investments in the state, the minister stated, “Additional investment of over Rs. 3,000 crore has also been received in the previously operated units of the Excise Department. Thus, an investment of Rs. 10888.73 crore is being made in the state.”
“The excise department is the main revenue-earning department of the state. Its revenue has increased by more than 3.7 times in the last 8 years. In 2016-2017, the excise revenue of the state was Rs. 14,273 crores, which increased to Rs. 52573.07 crores in 2024-25. The department contributes 24.75 per cent to the total revenue of the state and about 99 per cent of the revenue earned by the department is used for the development and welfare schemes,” said Agarwal.
In the first quarter of 2025-26, ₹14,228.91 crore has been achieved against the revenue target of ₹14,400 crore.
“While in 2017-18 the number of distilleries producing power alcohol in the state was only 44, at present their number has increased to 77,” he added.
