Alcohol ban on highways will include bars, hotels

where almost 90 per cent of liquor shops were to be closed because their relocation was not possible due to topographical constraints, have been completely exempt from this directive by the court.

Last December, the court ordered closure of all liquor shops along national and state highways if they were within a range of 500m from the edge of such highways, and directed governments to “cease and desist” from issuing excise licences after March 31.

A bench led by Chief Justice of India J S Khehar reduced the limit from 500m to 220m for “municipal corporation, city, town or local authority” provided the population was 20,000 or less after noting that the entire township might fall within the 500m-range.

In its 2016-order, the bench had also held that all existing licences to sell liquor would expire on April 1 and that fresh licences would be granted only after such vends relocate and comply with court-mandated stipulations.

Modifying this direction, the bench Friday said that subsisting licences could operate till September 30 since it has come to the notice of the court that not all states granted excise licences for a period between April 1 and March 30, and that there were variances in the time period of such licences.

The court noted that people had already made investments in getting the licences and a state like Telangana issued its licences in November 2016 — less than a month before the prohibition was imposed.

The operation of liquor vends, however, will be subject to their meeting the condition of their limits from the highways.

The Tamil Nadu government, said the bench, will not get any relaxation regarding the extension of licences till September 30 since liquor shops are run by the state government, which had agreed to comply with the April 1 deadline.

“The pernicious nature of the sale of liquor along national and state highways cannot be ignored. Drunken driving is a potent source of fatalities and injuries in road accidents. The Constitution preserves and protects the right to life as an over-arching constitutional value. The preservation of public health and of public safety is an instrument of enhancing the right to life as a constitutionally protected value,” said the bench.

About loss of revenue by relocating liquor shops, it said that it could be attractive to the vendor to sell liquor along the highway but that is not the touchstone of a norm which protects public health and seeks to curb fatalities on the highways of the nation.

“The states are free to realise revenues from liquor licences in the overwhelmingly large swathe of territories that lie outside the national and state highways and the buffer distance of 500 metres,” held the bench.

In its 2016 order, the court had asked police and municipal authorities to make sure that all liquor vends are closed permanently within the deadline. It also ordered removal of signages or boards indicating their location and held that no such vend can be allowed within a 100m range of a highway.

The bench had further directed chief secretaries and police chiefs of all state governments to chalk out a plan after deliberations with excise and municipal authorities to ensure strict compliance with its directives.

It underlined that the directives were being issued in public interest since the lives of millions were at stake and that state governments had failed to come on board for a uniform policy to ban liquor vends along highways.

Reminding the state governments of their Constitutional obligation to prohibit liquor sale, the bench had said that revenue generation cannot be the sole ground to let these vends continue along highways at the risk of giving rise to drunken driving and consequential fatalities.

Several states, including Punjab, Haryana and Himachal Pradesh, and the federation of hotel and restaurant associations had sought modifications in the order on various grounds. During the hearing, most of the parties had requested the court to defer the implementation of its order — the states submitted that the order would hit their excise revenue.