Chandigarh, February 24
The new excise policy for 2014-15, approved by the state Cabinet today, will lead to a fall in the retail prices of liquor. To increase revenue collections from excise by Rs 724 crore, the Cabinet has approved doubling the number of licencing units so as to increase competition, thus bringing down the liquor retail prices.

The government hopes to collect revenue worth Rs 4,671 crore against the target of Rs 3,947 crore for this fiscal. The government has also fixed the rates of liquor to be sold at marriage palaces. These will be displayed at the Excise Department website. If a complaint is received that a licensee has sold liquor at a rate higher than the prescribed rate, a fine of Rs 1 lakh will be imposed on the licensee. For the second offence, the fine would be doubled.

The licence of the liquor vend will be cancelled in case of yet another complaint. To bring about transparency in receiving applications for allotment of vends, banks will be authorised to receive applications. This will be in addition to the existing system of receeving applications in AETC offices. The department expects to collect Rs 50 crore extra as a result of this decision.

To reduce IMFL rates, the department has reduced the rates of extra licence fee on IMFL and tried to bring these on a par with those prevailing in neighbouring Haryana. There will be no change in the number of vends. The quota of country liquor has been increased from 920 lakh proof litres to 950 lakh proof litres.

The IMFL quota has been increased from 440 lakh proof litres to 450 lakh proof litres. The state Cabinet today offered incentives to ex-servicemen. It approved the Punjab Regulation of Fees of Unaided Educational Institutions Bill, 2014.

The Bill will be introduced during the Punjab Assembly session next week.

It will help check excessive fee being charged from students.