Distillery seeks direction to govt to buy liquor from it

Chennai, Sept 22 (UNI) The Midas Golden Distilleries Private Limited (MGDPL) today moved a petition in Madras High Court, seeking a direction to the Tamil Nadu Government to purchase liquor manufactured by it as done till April 2006, maintaining 23.63 per cent with respect to overall sale of TASMAC as was done earlier or in an alternative fixed by the court.

When the petition filed by Midas Golden Distilleries Private Limited (MGDPL), came up for hearing before Justice K Mohanram, the government advocate sought time to get instructions from the government.

Following this, the judge adjourned the hearing to September 26.

According to the petitioner, the company was purely a business venture and did not have any political clout nor any connection with any political personality or party functionaries.

The present government started harassment eversince it took over in May last. A kind of aversion and animosity was being shown to the company due to political dictation, he submitted.

The government was slowly reducing the allocation of spirit from June, which resulted in curtailing the production. Increased allocation was made to five other companies to eliminate the company, for political reasons, the petitioner submitted.

The company submitted that the government committed itself to boost the other distillers who were asked to produce larger quantitities, beyond their capacity to tide over the demand.

The shortlifting of liquor from the warehouses of the petitioner company resulting in lesser production than the assessed production or the capacity to produce liquor would indicate that the state was acting in an arbitrary manner.

The Secretary to Prohibition and Excise Department, the Special Commissioner and Commissioner of Prohibition and Excise were duty bound to release additional allottment of rectified spirit and special spirit. They were also returning the goods applying various kinds of economic blockade, the petitioner submitted.

The petitioner also filed another petition seeking to allocate additional allotment of rectified spirit to an extent of 47 lakh litres for the first quarter (April-June) and 34 lakh for the second quarter (July-September) together with 1.13 lakh litres of special spirit.

UNI XR VV SK PM2007