Rs 44 crore fall in licence fee collection

Deepkamal Kaur 

Tribune News Service 

Jalandhar, March 28

As the Department of Excise and Taxation will hold the draw of liquor vends tomorrow, its Jalandhar Division is set to see a fall of Rs 44 crore in the licence fee collection this time.

While the division, comprising Jalandhar-1, Jalandhar-2, Kapurthala, Phagwara, Nawanshahr and Hoshiarpur excise districts, collectively fetched the department a licence fee of Rs 849 crore in the last financial year, it is expected to remain low at Rs 805 crore this time.

Call it a demonetisation effect or the creation of bigger groups, the Jalandhar division has received only about 1,600 applications this time against about 10,000 applications last time. While there were 124 groups last time, the number has come down to just 36 this year. The number of vends too has fallen from 1,386 last time to 1,276 in the new financial year.

There, however, is an increase in the application fee this time. There are just three slabs according to revenue collection against seven last time. For zones having an expected collection of Rs 20 crore, the application fee is Rs 50,000. For zones fetching an income between Rs 20 and 30 crore, the application fee is Rs 75,000. The zones falling in the MC areas of Jalandhar, Phagwara and Hoshiarpur which fetch between Rs 30-40 crore income, an applicant has to pay Rs 1 lakh non-refundable fee.

Says Deputy Excise and Taxation Commissioner BK Birdi, “The demonetisation effect has certainly had an impact on the response this time. Those in liquor trade had been complaining of huge losses in the last four months of financial year 2016-17.”

In Jalandhar-1 district, there will be only eight zones for which the auction will be held tomorrow. These include six in the MC area and one each in Phillaur and Goraya. In Jalandhar-2, Kartarpur zone has been clubbed with Bhogpur this time. The other four zones are Adampur, Nakodar-1, Nakodar-2 and Nurmahal. While Jalandhar-1 is likely to make an income of Rs 265 crore, an amount of Rs 93.4 crore is expected from Jalandhar-2, said AETC Jalandhar-1 Darveer Raj and AETC Jalandhar-2 Maninder Singh.