CONRAD DIAS
Ranchi, Nov 7: As alcohol consumers in the city are made to pay a few extra bucks for their booze by the IMFL liquor shops in the city, an official from the excise department has advised people to use the JSBCL app to check the authenticity along with the revised price of the particular bottle.
Talking to lagatar24.com, Joint Commissioner of Excise Department Gajendra Kumar Singh said that the JSBCL app has been started to track and trace the stock of liquors and also for customers to know the genuineness of it.
“There were many brands whose prices were revised this year but the ones which are not revised should not be sold at a higher rate and even customers should not spend even a single penny extra for it. For this, we have launched the JSBCL app, on the play store, through which customers can scan a bottle and get every revised detail of that liquor including the current price,” he said.
He added that the app will also help customers to distinguish the fake liquor that has been circulating in the market illegally.
According to the customers, store owners charge an additional fee of between Rs 10 and Rs 20 for whiskey (180 and 360 ml bottles) and between Rs 30 and Rs 40 for 750 ml bottles. Similar to this, store owners are adding Rs 30 to the MRP of 650 ml beer bottles, which is regulated at Rs 210. One consumer claimed that calls to the toll-free number are also ignored.
A few customers also complained that as the cold is increasing in the city, the demand for a particular brand of rum called ‘Old Monk’ has also spiked up. However, just a few shops in the city have the gold reserve version of the popular rum and when asked they say “Abhi stock nahi aaya hai bhaiya.”
When asked about this, the joint commissioner refused to say anything regarding this.