Chennai: In order to prevent the Rs. 10 received under the empty liquor bottle return scheme from going to individuals and to generate revenue for the government, the MRP price has been officially increased by Rs. 10, said Minister for Prohibition and Excise Vignesh.
Regarding this, he told reporters at the Secretariat: It was disappointing that some news organizations and political party leaders said that TASMAC administration had increased the price of liquor by Rs. 10.
Previously, if the price of a liquor bottle was Rs. 140, they collected Rs. 10 extra and charged that if the liquor bottle was returned, Rs. 10 would be given. Collecting money without it going into the government account is wrong.
Whatever the money may be, the income and expenditure should be through the government only and should not go into private hands. With that in mind, Rs. 10 has now been imposed as an environmental cess.
From now on, if a bottle costs Rs. 150, the Rs. 150 will be in the account. If the bottle is returned, Rs. 10 will be given into the hands of the concerned people.
During the previous DMK regime, they said 99 percent of liquor bottles were returned. Since there was doubt about this, we inspected three shops. In that, 40 percent of the bottles were not returned.
We do not know where the Rs. 1,200 to Rs. 1,600 crore collected annually for those bottles went. We have brought in the new system so that this money should come to the government.
He said that they are going to introduce a system under which, even if a liquor bottle bought in one district is returned in another district, Rs. 10 can be collected. He said this.