Nagpur: Even as rumours were rife about the permission to allow sale of liquor in Saoji brand of restaurants across the region, Guardian minister and State excise minister Chandrashekhar Bawankule on Friday clarified that the State govenment had not yet taken any decision in this regard. “The reports about this in circulation are rumors and no one should believe in them,” lie said.
Some officials and media persons recently had claimed that the State excise department was going to grant licenses to the Saoji restaurants for liquor sale. However, on Friday during an informal chat with the scribes Bawankule clarified the stand of the government. Typically FL-3 licenses are issued to the restaurants for sale of liquor.
However various permissions from different departments including police, municipal corpora-tion, food and drugs administration etc are required. Moreover final decision is taken by the committee under the chairmanship of collector. The restaurant gets the permission only when every thing is found in order legally More than 90% of the Saoji restaurants in the Nagpur district are not eligible, Bawankule said.
The superintendent of excise department Pramod Sonone had claimed that four of the Saoji restaurants in the city have received the license to sell the liquor. When asked about it, Bawankule said that the decision to grant the license is taken by the committee of collector
