“Dry day” only until declaration of election results: HC
Bombay HC rules no liquor sales in Mumbai on June 4 until Lok Sabha results declared. Establishments can sell after. Court modifies collectors' order.
MUMBAI: The Bombay high court on Friday ruled that liquor won’t be allowed to be sold in Mumbai on June 4 only until the Lok Sabha election results are declared. Establishments can sell liquor for the rest of the day once the results are declared. The order modifies the directive issued by the Mumbai city collector stating the whole of June 4 as a dry day.The order was issued by a vacation bench comprising Justice NR Borkar and Justice Somasekhar Sundaresan, after noting that a similar order had previously been issued by another bench in response to a comparable notification from the Raigad district collector. The Association of Owners of Hotels, Restaurants, Permit Rooms, and Bars (AHAR) had recently challenged the dry day orders declared by the Mumbai city and suburban collectors for June 4, the parliamentary election counting day. According to AHAR’s petition, the orders prohibited the sale of liquor throughout the day, despite the likelihood that vote counting would be completed and results declared by the afternoon.On Tuesday, the petitioners’ advocates, Veena Thadani and Vishal Thadani, brought the petitions before a vacation bench of Justices Arif Doctor and Somasekhar Sundaresan for an urgent hearing. They argued that the collectors’ decision, based on directives from the Election Commission of India (ECI), was inflexible. ECI regulations mandate a dry day 48 hours before voting and on the day of counting.The petitioners contended that their members pay substantial license fees to the state government for their business operations. They highlighted that illicit liquor manufacturers and bootleggers exploit such dry day mandates to sell illegal alcohol, thereby profiting significantly when authorized outlets are closed.Thadani requested the court to modify the collectors’ orders, allowing establishments to resume liquor sales after the election results are announced. During Friday’s hearing, Additional Government Pleader Jyoti Chavan informed the court that the Mumbai Suburban collector had already adjusted its notification to limit the dry day to the announcement of results. However, the Mumbai city collector had refused to amend the notification.Observing the need for consistency across Mumbai, the court ordered that the restrictions on alcohol sales should cease once the election results are declared.
