The officials informed the Chief Minister that consumption of alcohol has come down from 384.31 lakh cases in 2018-19 to 278.5 lakh cases in 2021-22, during a review meeting held by Chief Minister YS Jagan Mohan Reddy here, at the CM Camp Office on Thursday. The sales of beer for the same period have come down from 277.10 lakh cases to 82.6 lakh cases. The revenue has gone up from Rs 20,128 crores to Rs 25,023 crores for the same period due to steep hike in prices.
Chief Minister convened a review meeting of revenue generating departments, including Excise, Mines and Panchayat Raj.
In all 20,127 cases were registered, 16,027 were arrested and 1407 vehicles were seized in cases of illicit liquor. In 2500 acres people shifted other crops while steps are being taken for horticulture in another 1600 acres, the officials said.
The Chief Minister told the officials to ensure that ganja and other such substances should be out of bounds to students and youth. SEB numbers should be displayed before all Colleges and Universities and there should be no reports of drug abuse. The Collectors should coordinate, he said.
The liquor consumption has come down due to steep hike of prices and shutting down of belt shops.
Those who are into brewing of illicit liquor and cultivating ganja should be shown alternative source of employment and encourage self-employment, he said.
The Chief Minister said that ACB toll free number 14400 should be displayed in all government offices. These boards should be on display from Village Secretariat to Collector’s Office, from police station to SP Office and at PDS shops as well, he said.
Sub registrar offices should be revamped so should be the passport offices.
Taking district as a unit, the Collectors should ensure that mining operations are carried out after acquiring the necessary permissions and amicably settle if there are any disputes so that there is no loss of revenue, he said.
There should be transparency in the sale of red sanders, he said for which the officials revealed that plans are afoot for sale of 2640 metric tons between October and March
Deputy Chief Minister K Narayanaswamy, Ministers Dharmana Prasada Rao, Peddireddy Ramchandra Reddy, P Viswaroop, Chief Secretary Sameer Sharma, DGP KV Ravindernath Reddy, Environment Special CS Neerab Kumar, MAUD Special CS Y Srilakshmi, Excise, Stamps and Registrations Special CS Rajath Bharghav, Panchayat Raj, Rural Development CS Gopalakrishna Dwivedi, Transport Department CS MT Krishna Babu, Home Department CS Harish Kumar, Finance Secretary Gulzar, APCRDA Commissioner Vivek Yadav and other officials were present.
