Liquor home delivery: Maharashtra government to stop service, here’s why

Maharashtra Deputy Chief Minister Ajit Pawar wrote a letter to the Excise department seeking an end to the liquor home delivery arrangement.

New Delhi: The Maharashtra government is all set to terminate the liquor delivery services in the state, as the number of Covid-19 cases remains low. Maharashtra Deputy Chief Minister Ajit Pawar, on Thursday, wrote a letter to the Excise department seeking an end to the home delivery arrangement. "As COVID-19 cases have been reduced, we will stop home delivery of liquor. It was an arrangement during the lockdown," the minister stated in his statement.

The government could pull back the liquor home delivery service with the daily number of Covid-19 cases going down in the state. The state government had allowed the home liquor delivery at a time when the Covid-19 induced lockdown was effective in the state. The motive behind the move was to curb the spread of the coronavirus in the state which was one of the most affected in the country. 

According to the notification, the government had allowed stores having FL-II, FL/BR-II, FL/W-II licenses to deliver liquor, beer, mild liquor and wine to customers’ homes under the Bombay Liquor Rules 1953.

Meanwhile, a startup named Booozie has announced starting a 10 minute-liquor delivery service in Kolkata. The startup from Hyderabad is the flagship brand of Innovent Technologies Private Limited. 

"Booozie is a delivery aggregator that picks up liquor from the nearest shop, with 10-minute delivery by using innovative AI which predicts consumer behaviour and order patterns," the startup said in a statement.

Further, Innovent Technologies said it has created a B2B logistics management platform, which will optimise the delivery costs thereby making Booozie an affordable platform. Also Read: Tata-owned Air India introduces VRS scheme for thousands of employees

"We welcome the move by the West Bengal government to open doors for aggregators to ease the deficit in the consumer demand and current supply in the market,” the company said in a statement. Also Read: To pay or not to pay service charge at restaurants? Centre terms it ‘illegal’, hospitality body calls it ‘tip’