It’s dry days in Karnataka as liquor stores, bars run out of stocks due to tech glitch

BENGALURU: The state government, which had raked in huge excise revenue over the last three months, in now incurring losses of Rs 100 crore every day. It’s not that people have started drinking less, but supply of liquor to bars and liquor stores has been affected, denting their businesses also. The reason: The stock booking portal is down since the start of this month.

The state had set a record by selling 23 crore litres of liquor during the economic distress, bringing Rs 7,500 crore revenue for the government. Three months ago, the government launched a portal for retailers to book their stocks. But for the last few days, the portal has been down, forcing retailers to queue up before warehouses of the Karnataka State Beverages Corporation.

The Excise Department had been claiming that the glitches will be fixed soon. But even after four days, when the portal could not be restored, the department started issuing liquor stocks to retailers by making manual entries. Excise revenue accounts for about Rs 29,000 crore annually, and the government is suffering Rs 100 crore losses every day now, due to the software glitch.
Karunakar Hegde, president of the liquor retailers’ association said, “Ever since they introduced the new software, we are having problems. Even after paying for it, we are not getting adequate stocks. Many bars have put up ‘No Stock’ boards. Either bring back the old system, fix the problems with the software. How can we have recurring problems? The officials are to blame for this.”