Haryana Excise Department recorded highest revenue collection during COVID-19: Haryana Deputy Chief Minister, Mr. Dushyant Chautala informed that Haryana Excise Department has recorded highest revenue collection during COVID-19.

Prior to this, the Excise Department had never collected such high amount of revenue in the first quarter of the year.

Mr. Chautala was interacting with mediapersons at Haryana Niwas here today. The Deputy Chief Minister, who holds the portfolio of Excise and Taxation Department, said that Haryana’s Excise Department has made a new record in the Excise Duty Collection.  He said that neither the rail service nor the multi-national companies were functioning due to the lockdown and COVID-19. In such a situation, increasing revenue was the biggest challenge for the Excise Department. The Department has earned an additional Rs 262,98,42,438 under different heads as compared to last year’s quarter.  This includes permit and retail license fees in addition to excise and additional excise duty.

Reacting to the allegations of scam in Excise Department by some people, he said that the Excise Department has never made such high revenue collection as during COVID-19, which reflects that there is no scam. While sharing data and facts, the Deputy Chief Minister said that since the formation of the state till today, it is for the first time in this year that the government has collected additional excise duty of more than Rs 27 crore in the first quarter of the new excise policy. This excise duty is 2,700 times more than the first quarter of last year which is a record in itself.  During the year 2019-20, the government received additional excise duty of only Rs. 95,150 in the first quarter. He further added that earlier in 2016-17, from the first quarter i.e. from April 1 to June 30, Rs 2,88,93,916, Rs 3,01,97,448 in 2017-18 and 1,30,01,437 in 2018-19  were collected as additional excise duty.

Mr. Dushyant Chautala shared that the new excise policy could not be implemented in the state from April 1 this year due to the lockdown. The State Government gave permission to opened liquor vends from May 5 under Unlock-1. In the aforesaid circumstances the new excise policy was enforced from May 6. The cabinet has amended the policy and implemented it till May 5, 2021. In such a situation, the Department has collected an additional excise duty of Rs 27,58,28,478 through country made liquor and Indian-made foreign liquor from May 6 till now.

In response to a question asked by a mediaperson, the Deputy Chief Minister said that the GPS tracking system would be installed in the vehicles coming out of the distillery. A committee has been constituted for this purpose, which is also observing the practices in other states and it will be implemented soon. He informed that the process of installation of CCTV is in the final stages and by the end of September all the distilleries will have CCTVs. The DETC has been directed to go to the distillery and check the cameras every 15 days in the districts which have distillery. The Deputy Chief Minister said that electronic temp-proof flow-metres are being installed in all distilleries and it is expected that flow-meters will be installed in the next one month. He said that during the lockdown, an enquiry has been conducted against the officers issuing the permit and pass from March 27 to March 31 and action will be taken against those found guilty as soon as the investigation is completed. 

Rs 62 crore surplus retail license fee

This is also the first time in the Excise Department when additional retail license fee of Rs 62 crore was received in the first quarter as compared to the previous year. In the first quarter last year, the Department received Rs 1447,43,41,549 from retail license fees.  At the same time, Rs 1509,36,27,462 of this fee has been received. Similarly, the department has also received permit fees of more than Rs 4 crore this time. Thus, a total of Rs 62.70 crore was received from the permit fees in the first quarter last year and this time Rs 66.39 crore.

Around Rs 75 crore COVID cess collected on liquor

Deputy Chief Minister said that during COVID the state government has imposed a COVID-cess on liquor.  In the first three months of COVID-cess, the Excise Department has earned Rs 74,80,57,183.