As the two-year lease period of the 6,600 liquor shops in the State draws to a close on June 30 amidst a huge scam, the emerging scenario is that the present system of allotment of shops by the bidding process will be discontinued and the selection done by draw of lots.
Confirming that the shops will not be leased out on the basis of bidding under any circumstances, a senior excise official told The Hindu that the government was actively considering introduction of lottery system though it was argued in defence of the present system that it enabled exploiting market potential and helped in getting revenue upfront which was Rs.7,000 crore in the last two years. He added that the government was not looking at increasing the number of shops nor growth in revenue from the allotments this time in view of the scam which had political overtones after a liquor syndicate owner, Nunna Venkataramana, claimed that he paid a bribe of Rs.10 lakh to Excise Minister Mopidevi Venkataramana. There were also allegations that AP Congress Committee president Botcha Satyanarayana and his followers controlled half of the 203 shops in Vizianagaram district.
In Khammam, it was found that liquor syndicates, in connivance with excise officials, introduced new owners for shops after the tendering process by manipulating records and fabricating documents. The Excise department has favoured lucky dip to select shops for different slabs of population, each of which will have a fixed licence fee to be determined on the basis of the modal value (most frequently occurring value) of shops in that slab. The slabs will be for four or five categories of population with village, municipality and municipal corporations as units.
Sources said the government always aimed at 10 to 15 per cent growth in revenue from sale of shops but this had to be sacrificed this time because of the hostile atmosphere created by the scam which led to the arrest of 101 persons so far. They included a former Collector, 23 excise and 10 police officials and 67 leaders, members and workers of liquor syndicates.
The drawal of lots would be in sharp contrast to the auctions conducted last time in June 2010 and earlier when the shops were allotted to the highest bidders over and above a predetermined upset price. The government had hiked the upset price by 15 per cent over the amount fixed in 2008 but earned 80 to 100 per cent on each shop in the bidding process by sealed tenders.
