Beer dries up in Gurugram, people turn to Delhi for their liquor

Liquor vends across the city have alleged a shortage of stock of beer to serve their customers for more than a month, with some even claiming of having to go to

Liquor vends across the city have alleged a shortage of stock of beer to serve their customers for more than a month, with some even claiming of having to go to national capital Delhi just to purchase their stock.

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The wholesale vends said they have not received their supply of beer for the last 40 days at least, despite regular follow-ups with the excise officials in the district and those in Panchkula.

Excise officials, however, said that the delay in supply was owing to the Covid cess — between ₹10 and ₹30 on a beer bottle — that had been announced by the state government and which required labels on all bottles to be changed.

HC Dahiya, deputy excise and taxation commissioner (west), said that every time there is a change in taxation or policy, the retail price changes as does the label on the product. “Every brand manufacturer has to get approval for these changes from the excise department before releasing their product in the market,” he said.

Officials said that the manufacturers, after getting labels approved, supply the beer to the distributors, who then in turn take it to the liquor vends. The beer manufacturing factories are located in Dharuhera, Sonipat , Ambala and Beri near Jhajjar.

Dahiya said nearly 9 lakh cases of beer are sold in a month across Haryana, out of which 4 lakh cases are sold in Gurugram alone. Each case of beer consists of 12 beer bottles.

Rakesh Kumar, manager at a liquor store on Golf Course Extension Road said they had not received beer stock since the shops reopened on May 6 and have been suffering from loss of both revenue and customers. “We don’t have any stock of beer in our outlet. This has pulled down our sales by almost 50% on a daily basis,” he said.

Another employee of a liquor vend in Sector 40 said, “We have absolutely run out of our stock of beer also in the shop and we have no idea when the situation will return to normal. A majority of our customers, during summer, prefer to buy beer. But for the last one month, we have not been able to get any stock of beer and this is causing heavy losses,” said Arun Kumar.

The liquor vend owners said due to the shortage, their customers were turning towards Delhi, where beer is cheaper when compared to the city.

A case of beer costs ₹3,000 (light) and ₹2,100 (strong) in Gurugram. Delhi, on the other hand, sells the same beer at ₹1,900 (light beer) and ₹2000 (strong beer) for a case.

Shashank Kumar, another liquor vend owner, said that only a few brands, which are not so popular among his customers, lay on his shelves. “If the beer shortage issue is not resolved, Delhi will take over and we will suffer losses and the excise department revenues will be hit,” he said.

The excise officials said that new beer labels , which have been approved by the excise taxation commissioner, were pending. “There is no deliberate delay from the department’s side and we have already issued all labels. The beer supply will be sorted out within a week and other issues related will be resolved at the earliest,” said Shekhar Vidyarthi, excise and taxation commissioner (ETC), Panchkula.

Around 218 liquor shops located in Gururgam opened on May 6, after the state government announced a series of relaxations, following the implementation of Lockdown 3.0 in the state.