Little choice for liquor consumer
Tribune News Service

CHANDIGARH, Oct 23 — Due to certain aspects in the ongoing liquor trade, the consumer is paying more for liquor, including beer, while he is not getting a choice of brands at all vends.

The consumer is paying more as the rates of select or popular brands of whisky, rum or beer, manufactured by some of the top breweries in the country, are selling for more than what should be the price, said sources. Liquor contractors allege that a cartel is operating at the ''L-1'' licencee level that is controlling the supply of all popular brands manufactured by the some of top breweries in the countries.

One of the liquor contractors in the city, Mr Satya Pal said, "The excise department must ensure that popular brands are not cornered by one wholesaler and it should make it a point that all breweries have more than one wholesaler in the city.'' Such a monopoly has to be broken by the Administration alone,he said.

The sale of the breweries, whose samples were collected a few days ago, was not stopped due to some problem with the sample-filling exercise, the contractors claim. They also denied the reported claim of an executive of a liquor company that said spurious liquor was being sold in Chandigarh. "How is this possible ?" Mr Satya Pal questioned.

On the other hand, Mr Pawan Singla , who is the sole wholesaler for some of the reputed brands of the country, said this is not a case of monopolsing the trade. Nowhere is it mentioned in the excise policy that a brewery can have one, two or three or even more wholesalers. It is the wish of the liquor company to appoint anyone as the wholesaler in a territory.

Mr Singla claimed that the retailers send him a requestion slip and the goods are supplied immediately. He denied allegations that the wholesale price was being dictated by the demands of the market.

Meanwhile, the consumer does not get all the brands in any of the vends. If beer of a particular brewery is stocked, other goods of other breweries are not. Same is true for whisky and rum. So consumers have to to go to a particular vend to get a drink of their choice.

Even the prices have gone up as the inflow of liquor is being controlled by some vested interests . Sources pointed out that political linkages had resulted in such a situation.