The Uttarakhand high court has approved the proposal of the state government regarding the state excise policy. Under the new proposal, after increasing the revenue by 15%, the licensees will now be able to complete formalities for the lottery of 283 vacant shops by April 5.
On Friday, in the division bench of chief justice Vipin Sanghi and justice Alok Kumar Verma, advocate general SN Babulkar and chief standing counsel Chandrashekhar Rawat requested for hearing the matter on Friday itself. They informed the court that the allotment of the shops has now been extended till April 5.
The excise department will issue a new advertisement on Saturday. Earlier, the court had fixed April 13 for the next hearing, directing the government to file its reply in the matter by April 10. Due to this the auction could not be held on March 31.
Ramnagar resident Vikas Chandra has filed a petition saying that the government has announced a new excise policy on March 22, which is to be implemented from April 1. The petitioner submitted that wine shop owners were given less time for renewal. Along with this, the allotment time of the lottery of 283 liquor shops was also reduced.
The government had said on March 25 that the old licensees should renew their shops by March 29, after that the 283 shops which have not been renewed were to be auctioned on March 31 through a lottery system.
March 30 was a government holiday and the shop was to be allotted through lottery on Friday.
