Smaller restaurants in Delhi to be able to serve beer, wine

Smaller restaurants in the city will soon be able to serve beer and wine with Delhi Government deciding to allow them to serve spirits with low alcohol content keeping the coming Commonwealth Games in mind.

"We will issue L 4D licence to restaurants allowing them to serve beer and wine," Delhi Finance Minister A K Walia, who also looks after the excise department, told PTI.

Walia said to apply for such licence, any restaurant will have to get no objection certificate from MCD and police.

He said the excise department has laid down "certain conditions and criteria" to issue licence to serve beer and wine to the restaurants. "The annual licence fee per restaurant will be Rs 50,000."

At present, an annual fee of Rs two lakh is charged for permitting restaurants to serve alcohol, effectively allowing only big eateries to offer such services.

Officials said the decision was taken keeping the upcoming Commonwealth Games in view as nearly one lakh foreign visitors are expected to be in Delhi during the event. They said the process of issuing such licence to restaurants is underway.

Last week, government had granted licences to nine malls allowing them to sell alcohol. Imported foreign liquor and almost all brands of Indian Made Foreign Liquor (IMFL) will be available at the malls located across the city, including Laxmi Nagar, Janakpuri, Raja Garden, Rohini and Wazirpur.

The city government late last year had decided to allow sell of liquor in shopping malls to offer the citizens as well as visitors of the Commonwealth Games a better environment to buy liquor.