Quarter, Half Bottles To Soon Be Available In Bars and Restaurants Across Telangana

HYDERABAD: The Telangana State Excise Department in a bid to revive loss-making bars in the State has decided to revise the rules where they will be simplifying the licensing procedure, reducing bank guarantees, payment of license fees, and increasing the commissions. With the new rules quarter and half bottle liquor bottles will soon be available in bars and restaurants across Telangana state The orders to this effect will be issued in a day or two as per reports in Sakshi.

The Excise department is said to be taking this decision to provide financial support to 1,172 bars in the state which were financially impacted after the COVID crisis. It is being discussed in the excise circles that the government has made these changes with the intention of improving these bars financial condition.

Till now quarter and half quantity bottles are available only in wine shops, but now the excise department is giving permission to bars and restaurants as well, to which the wine shop owners are not quite happy about. They say that if quarter and half bottles are sold in bars and restaurants, their sales would suffer.

But the Excise Department says that these quantities of liquor are already available in star hotels under 2B (Bar and Restaurant) licenses and now they are applying the same rule to general bars and restaurants. It is said that by taking this step the consumer will have confidence in the alcohol brands he purchases and the issue of stock problems would also be solved and in turn, the manufacturers will also benefit.

As per rules so far there were no sales of quarter and half bottles and only full bottles were sold. There was an option to pay license fee in three installments. Part payment of license fees was to be shown for a bank guarantee.

There is a 20% commission to bar owners if they sell five times their worth of liquor compared to the license fee. After that, 13.6% of the value of liquor sold is given to the government and 6.4% to the bar owners as a commission. Renewal of license only if all documents are submitted annually.

If the new rules come to effect these are the changes: 

► Quarter and half bottles will be available in bars.

► Flexible payment of license fee in 4 installments.

► 25% license fee as a bank guarantee will be sufficient.

► 20 percent commission on liquor sales up to seven times the license fee. 10 percent will go to the government and 10 percent will be given to the bar owners.

► Auto-renewal of license if the restaurant license is shown and the fees are paid.

Also Read: Telangana becomes first state to launch robotics policy framework