Drink all the wine in the world, as far as the Excise Dept’s concerned

The Punjab Excise Department has shown deteriorating performance over the past few years due to a lack of personnel and non-existence of transfers within the department, Pakistan Today has learnt.
Consequently, several four and five star hotels are increasingly making illegal alcohol sales to consumers while the officials stand unable to take any action against them causing the department’s revenue to decline.
According to sources, the department used to have four assistants for every excise officer to maintain proper records of alcohol sale from officially designated points. At present, sources claimed, the excise officer is working alone, which has overburdened the department.
The past five years have seen an exponential increase in alcohol sales from private hotels due to the department’s inefficiency, sources said. Officials get posted to stations of their choice and most of the time stage fake raids to enhance their performance on record, claimed sources. They often sell the confiscated alcohol to peddlers, adding water to it. The department has not raided any of the famous hotels that are selling alcohol beyond the prescribed time nor taken steps to check their records, said sources, adding that most of these hotels have outdated or fake licenses permitting sale which have become a major source of illegal income for officers from the department.
Sources said that Punjab Minister for Excise and Taxation Mujtaba Shujaur Rehman presided over a meeting a few days ago, which was also attended by director general and secretary of the department. The meeting decided to overhaul the department and to replace and transfer existing officers who had been stationed at a position for the past many years. However, none of these decisions have been implemented so far.
Talking to Pakistan Today, Excise Director Region B Ashiq Hussain Shah said that the department’s performance was satisfactory. He said that if the officers did their jobs with sincerity, there would be no need to hire four assistants under each one of them. He further said that if complaints were made against any official from the department, due action would be taken.
He asserted that only hotels with legal permits sold alcohol, which is available at these points from 8am to 6pm only. No sale is made outside these hours, he said categorically. However contrary to the official’s claim, Pakistan Today observed that liquor is being sold at the designated hotels on inflated rates till 10pm – almost 4 hours beyond the allowed time.
“The bar room personnel indulge in illegal sales with due knowledge of the hotel management. The excise officials are also hand in glove with them which is why no action is taken against them,” a bootlegger standing outside the bar room of a posh five star hotel on The Mall confided to Pakistan Today. He said that last year the excise department and managements of the four hotels had a major standoff over “cuts” from liquor sold to non-permit holders. “The excise department started delaying issuance of permits to entitled persons and started making frequent raids at the hotels to pressurise the bar room managers. The bar room personnel resorted to charging exorbitant prices from people buying alcohol. After a couple of months, the two sides were able to come up with a distribution formula and it is business as usual now,” he said.
A bar room manager of a local hotel refused to comment on the illegal liquor sale but said that excise officials often employ various tactics to extort money from them. “No hotel can refuse excise officials’ demand for free rooms and alcohol. Yet their hunger for more money does get on our nerves sometimes,” he said.