Bengaluru: In a bid to bring in massive transformation in the Excise Department, which is mired with the allegations of large scale corruption, the Karnataka government is bringing in a comprehensive amendment to the 60-years-old Excise Rules, de-regularising the government pricing and distribution system.
While presenting his 17th budget in the Legislative Assembly on Friday, Chief Minister Siddaramaiah said that under the new policy, the government administered price fixation of liquor will be completely deregulated.
The government will be adopting globally accepted Alcohol-in-Beverage (AIB) based excise duty structure, as it directly targets the alcohol content, which is primarily a source of negative externalities. The product placement within slabs will be left to the producers based on market considerations and the pricing slabs will be rationalised and reduced to 8 slabs from the existing 16 slabs.
Besides, instead of the present personnel monitored distribution system, technology driven reforms are being rolled out to curb revenue leakage through blockchain-based digital tracking systems. Physical escorts for dispatches will be replaced with geo-fenced e-lock systems. This will enhance transparency and enable real time oversight, he said.
Stating that the reforms are based on the recommendations made by the Resource Mobilisation Committee (RAC), which will be placing its recommendations in the public domain soon to invite suggestions. However, the Excise Act amendments will come into immediate effect during this year itself, Siddaramaiah said.
Also Watch:
Apart from reforms in pricing and distribution, the government has decided to go with auto-renewal of liquor manufacturing license and label approvals and RVB licenses (which are short term licenses) will be auto-generated upon online self declaration and payment of fees with deemed approval and no manual intervention.
The Distilleries and breweries will be permitted 24-hour operations and dispatch. The requirement to display mandatory malt and sugar content on beer labels will also be removed.
