‘Bar Open Now...It’s Party Time,’ declared a board outside The Grill Mill, one of the many restaurants in Gurugram’s popular haunt — DLF CyberHub.
On Thursday evening, the Excise Department gave the premises a clean chit with regard to renewal of liquor licences.
‘Big relief’
“We received confirmation from Excise officials around 7 p.m. and started serving liquor soon after. The news has come as big relief for bar owners and the staff. CyberHub has a place of pride and it is welcome news for regular visitors. However, it might take a few days before people get to know about it,” said Ashwini Chaudhary, who owns Soi7 at CyberHub.
Another restaurant, Twist, announced, ‘We were on break, Twist is wet again’.
Arvind Kumar, manager at The Wine Company, said that though food joints had managed somehow, outlets that serve only liquor were the worst hit. “We suffered huge losses in the last one month and had to remain closed. The bar was under renovation all this while and most of our staff had gone on leave. We did get a hint about some good news coming our way on Thursday morning. Most outlets here started serving liquor soon after they got confirmation in the evening,” said Mr. Kumar.
Visitors surprised
Not just restaurants, visitors were in for a pleasant surprise as well. Akshay Tomar, 33, who works with Fluor Daniel India Limited in Cyber City, said that he was “super happy” to know that the ban had been lifted. “I had been visiting bars on Golf Course Road all this while. Though I managed to save some money, I will celebrate with friends tomorrow [on Friday],” said Mr. Tomar, a local.
Manish Kohli, manager at The Grill Mill, said that sales had dropped by over 50% in the last month. Mr. Kohli added that he expected things to return to normal by the weekend. “It has been just a few hours since the ban was lifted. It will take a few days for the news to spread and the customers to come back,” he said.
Delay in approval
CyberHub, along with several bars and prominent hotels, had gone dry on April 1 after a Supreme Court order banned the sale of liquor within 500m of national and State highways. While most bars, including those in Sector 29, and prominent hotels were allowed to serve liquor earlier, CyberHub saw a delay as layout plans and approvals awaited clearance from the departments concerned.
On Thursday morning, the monitoring committee sent a report to the Haryana Excise Commissioner after receiving layout plans and a report from the Department of Town and Country Planning on Wednesday. “A few hours later, we received a mail from the Excise Commissioner clearing the case for renewal of licences for CyberHub,” said Deputy Excise and Taxation Commissioner (West) H.C. Dahiya.
