Bhubaneswar: Excise minister Prithiviraj Harichandan on Thursday said the govt won’t allow opening of new liquor shops and would instead focus on checking illegal sale of liquor.
Speaking to the media about an upcoming liquor policy, the minister said, “The govt has decided to simplify the policy. While no new shop will be opened, focus will be on checking sale of illicit liquor, which poses a challenge.”

The new policy will be for the September to March interim period.“In next year’s policy, there will be drastic changes to prevent sale of illicit liquor. No new shop will be opened,” the minister said.
Odisha now has 1,163 foreign liquor ‘off’ shops (counters for sale only, where one can’t consume booze) and 702 ‘on’ shops (where buyers can consume liquor).
Similarly, the state has 56 beer parlours and 19 clubs with liquor licence. As many as 36 military canteens operate in the state where liquor is available.
In view of elections this year, the previous Naveen Patnaik-led govt had come out with an excise policy for the April to July period. The Mohan Majhi-led govt extended the policy till August 31 with a rider that no new liquor shop will be opened in rural areas.
The new interim policy will be notified soon, govt sources said.
In the current policy, which came in force in April, the govt’s focus was on meeting revenue target through enforcement measures and create awareness against alcohol abuse.
Excise revenue of the state has been steadily growing over the years. It has grown from Rs 1,780.29 crore in 2013-14 to Rs 6,454 crore in 2022-23. The govt estimates the revenue for 2024-24 to be around Rs 8,680 crore.
As per the policy, to boost ‘Make-ln-Odisha,’ entrepreneurs and companies, who have invested in Odisha through breweries, microbreweries, distilleries, winery or bottling units are exempted from new label registration criteria, which is at least Rs 1.5 lakh per year and increases with volumes of production.
They can introduce Odisha specific labels or brands to cater to the choice of local consumers.

We also published the following articles recently