Delhi govt's new excise policy receives suggestions on lowering legal drinking age for beer

New Delhi | The Delhi government has received suggestions to lower the legal drinking age from 25 years to 21 years specifically for beer, in the new excise policy being prepared by a high-level committee, even as no decision has been taken so far, official sources said on Thursday.

The Committee headed by Public Works Department (PWD) minister Parvesh Verma is currently taking feedback from various groups of stakeholders.

"Nothing has been decided so far, and discussion over the new policy and its various aspects are being looked into at the meetings with stakeholders, including liquor manufacturers and retailers among others," sources said.

A senior Delhi government official said the government is aiming to boost excise revenue while ensuring that no inconvenience is caused to the people at large. The idea of lowering the legal drinking age is also being discussed as Delhi has the highest permissible age of 25 years for the sale of liquor.

In all the neighbouring NCR cities, including Gurgaon, Noida, Ghaziabad, and Faridabad, the legal drinking age is 21 years. This disparity causes loss of revenue as youngsters below 25 years visit those places to purchase liquor, he added.

"It has been suggested that under the new excise policy, the legal age for consumption of beer could be lowered from 25 years to 21 years to plug the loss of revenue ," the official said.

The new policy is also likely to ensure no public inconvenience is caused due to retail liquor vends by locating them away from residential and crowded areas or places like educational institutions and religious structures, sources said.

For this purpose, it was proposed that the policy could have some provision to facilitate opening liquor vends in malls and supermarkets.

"Presently, only 14 liquor vends are situated in the malls, whose number goes to more than a hundred in the city. This is because high rental charges discourage investors from opening liquor vends in the malls," another official said.

Further, it was also suggested by stakeholders that liquor sale could be started at fuel stations and at shopping complexes in the city, he said.

The Committee is also considering various suggestions to prevent brand-pushing provisions under the policy, which is likely to be finalised in the next three to four months, the sources said.

Presently, the margin on per bottle of liquor is the same for high-end liquor and cheaper, mass-consumed brands, they said.

"As a result, the liquor vends stock cheaper, less well-known brands and avoid more popular but costly brands, resulting in brand-pushing," they added.

It has also been noticed that a large number of cheaper brands were being registered so that the same liquor under different brand names is pushed in bulk at the liquor vends run by the four corporations of the Delhi government, after every few months to avoid detection in the rise in their sales, they added.

The government intends to boost excise revenue by ensuring that the loss caused due to Delhi people buying liquor from NCR cities could be checked through policy interventions, sources further said.

The excise revenue of Delhi, which is currently around Rs 8,000 crore, could be raised to around Rs 12,000 crore by plugging leakage that causes a loss of around Rs 4,000–5,000 crore annually, they added.

The retail liquor business in Delhi is currently controlled by four corporations of the Delhi government that run more than 700 shops in different parts of the city.

Sources also claimed that the policy might propose a hybrid model, permitting both government agencies and private players in retail liquor sales. But nothing is finalised so far, they added.