UT Excise Dept makes hologram, barcode must on liquor bottles

Ramkrishan Upadhyay

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Tribune News Service

Chandigarh, May 20

Making hologram and barcode must on liquor bottles, the Excise Department of the UT Administration will start a drive to check the sale of spurious and illegal liquor in the city.

Sources said the department would soon procure handy machines to scan hologram and barcode.

Ajit Balaji Joshi, Deputy Commissioner-cum-Commissioner Excise and Taxation, said with the help of these machines, it would be possible for the department staff to check on the spot if a liquor bottle brought from any vendor in the city is genuine or not.

He said while the department had made the hologram must on bottles in the Excise Policy announced for 2018-19 for all companies, it will ensure that the provision is followed in toto.

He said every bottle of liquor transported legally to the city would have a unique identification number accessible through the machine.

The department had recently organised a training camp for its staff on how to operate the machines to read barcode and hologram. Hologram has an additional security feature that will make it almost impossible for duplication. Details like month, batch and serial number will also be included in the hologram, which makes it possible to track the actual source of a liquor bottle.

Officials can check the genuineness by just throwing the light on liquor bottles. The genuine hologram will generate a beep sound as soon as the light falls on it. Chandigarh is one of the biggest markets of liquor and the department has been facing the problem of smuggling in the past. Due to the difference in the rates, smuggling is a major challenge for the department.

Features of hologram

Hologram has an additional security feature that will make it almost impossible for duplication. Details like month, batch and serial number will also be included in the hologram, which makes it possible to track the actual source of a liquor bottle.

How machine will work

Officials can check the genuineness by just throwing light on liquor bottles. The genuine hologram will generate a beep sound as soon as the light falls on it.