E-Paper
Old bottle to serve new wine
Why are hotels of Uttar Pradesh State Tourism Development Corporation running into losses? The answer could lie in the following illustration.
Why are hotels of Uttar Pradesh State Tourism Development Corporation running into losses? The answer could lie in the following illustration.
At Gomti Hotel’s Tashna Bar, a bar tender in connivance with the bar manager is selling liquor illegally. And through this activity, UPSTDC is losing more than Rs 60 lakh per year.
The act has been reported to higher officials and a committee inquired into the mattera and submitted its report. But the department is sitting over the report and no action has been taken against the employees involved in the criminal practice.
When contacted, however, Principal Secretary Tourism Om Prakash said if there was any such incident, appropriate action would be taken against the offenders.
The bar employees are committing this fraud in an organised way. The bar tender, who is a daily-wage employee, pours liquor brought from outside in an empty liquor bottle used in the bar holding the excise number and sells liquor which is unaccounted. On an average, the bar tender earned a profit of more than Rs 1,000 on every bottle sold, alleged Uttar Pradesh Tourism Corporation Employees Association.
They are also making fast bucks through commission of Rs 1,200 per month by over billing in ice bought for bar use. Ice for the bar has been brought at Rs 9 per kg when the company supplying ice to the hotel quotes Rs 5.75 per kg. Illegal sale of cigarettes and cigar too goes on unchecked in the bar. Bar scrap, meanwhile, has been sold illegally without going through the official process.
The employee association also alleged that the bar attendant who is a daily wage employee deputed on a monthly salary of Rs 3,000, is an influential person. He holds a property worth around Rs 50 lakh in the city and has good connections with higher authorities of the department. The services of this bar tender have been terminated by the department twice but he managed to get re-entry the third time, alleged president of the employees association, PN Chaubey.
