In high spirits! People in UP drink liquor worth Rs 115 crore every day, says excise dept

According to the Uttar Pradesh excise department, people in the state are gulping down liquor and beer worth Rs 115 crore every day. This is almost a 35 per cent increase from two years ago when the state residents consumed liquor worth Rs 85 crore per day, a media report highlighted.

"There are several districts in the state where liquor and beer worth Rs 12 crore to Rs 15 crore are being consumed in the span of a day," Hindustan Times reported quoting a senior excise department official. Meanwhile, almost every district in the state records liquor sales worth over Rs 2.5 crore to Rs 3 crore each day.

The places leading in terms of heavy sales include -- Noida and Ghaziabad (Rs 13 crore to Rs 14 crore daily), Agra (Rs 12 crore to Rs 13 crore each day), Meerut (around Rs 10 crore ever day), Lucknow (Rs 10 crore to Rs 12 crore in a day), Kanpur (Rs 8 crore to Rs 10 crore per day), and Varanasi (Rs 6 crore to Rs 8 crore each day).

As for Prayagraj, liquor and beer worth Rs 4.5 crore are sold in a day on an average.

Jitendra Kumar Singh, district excise officer, Prayagraj cited a number of factors that have led to the increase in sales over the past few years. Some of the factors are higher social acceptability, improvement in standard of living among the consumers, and effective check on smuggling of liquor, among others. "All this has had a positive impact on liquor sales," he told HT.

It must be noted that the Uttar Pradesh excise department created a record by generating revenue of a whopping Rs 41,250 crore during the 2022-23 financial year. The revenue was 14 per cent higher when compared to the previous year (2021-22).