This story is from November 28, 2015

Booze ban in Bihar: Not an easy task to enforce prohibition

Chief minister Nitish Kumar has sought to fulfil the promise he made to women by announcing ban on liquor from April 1 next year, but law-enforcing agencies foresee challenges in effective enforcement of the ban as the state shares porous borders with Nepal, UP, Jharkhand and West Bengal where there is no prohibition.
Booze ban in Bihar: Not an easy task to enforce prohibition
PATNA: Chief minister Nitish Kumar has sought to fulfil the promise he made to women by announcing ban on liquor from April 1 next year, but law-enforcing agencies foresee challenges in effective enforcement of the ban as the state shares porous borders with Nepal, UP, Jharkhand and West Bengal where there is no prohibition.
Sources said at least nine to ten crore bottles of 200ml country liquor is sold every month across the state.
"The consumption of India-made foreign liquor (IMFL) is also very high," an excise department official told TOI on Friday and added a good number of Bacchus lovers in the state were resourceful enough to avail of the services of bootleggers to fulfil their needs.
Excise department sources said prohibition would bleed the state exchequer of at least Rs 5,500 crore, which includes Rs 4,000 crore as excise and Rs 1,500 crore as VAT. "For now we don't know whether the ban will be restricted to country liquor or every drink containing alcohol. If it's only on country liquor, the state's revenue loss would be limited to around Rs 1,500-2,000 crore annually. For, at least 65% revenue is from IMFL," an official said and added a slight increase in taxes on IMFL might minimise the loss.
Bihar deputy CM Tejashwi Prasad Yadav and state excise and prohibition minister Abdul Jalil Mastan, meanwhile, have asserted Bihar would be made a dry state irrespective of the revenue loss to the state government. "We are more worried about the health of people than the loss of revenue to our government," said Mastan.
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