Siliguri/Kolkata, June 9 (UNI) Bottlers in the state have demanded the immediate abolition of the "distributorship system" in the West Bengal State Beverages Corporation Limited (WBSBCL) after The Statesman expose, on the authority of a confidential report, of a possible liquor scam perpetrated by high-ranking excise department officials to the benefit of former Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee’s nephew Abhishek Banerjee.
Thousands of crores of rupees extorted from liquor and beer bottlers were said to have been siphoned off in the possible scam.
Bottlers told The Statesman that a total of 36 bottlers across the state allegedly suffered and were extorted by the ‘distributors’, allegedly under the instructions of TMC National General Secretary Abhishek Banerjee.
The excise department policy was overhauled in 2017 after the Trinamul Congress (TMC) returned to power for a second term. Later, following the party’s third successive victory in the 2021 Assembly elections, the policy was modified once again in a calibrated manner to introduce the system of distributors.
When the TMC government altered the excise policy in 2017 and established WBSBCL, bottlers readily accepted it. According to a bottler, things were running smoothly, “but trouble began just after the introduction of distributors in 2021.”
“This distributorship system should be abolished immediately,” Sankey Agarwal, associated with Ramesh Agarwal Bottling Plant at Kharagpur in West Midnapore district, told The Statesman.
Subhojit Guho Choudhury, member of the board of directors of Monalisa Bottling Plant in Jalpaiguri, said: “We were helpless from February 1, 2022, when the distributors took control of the entire system. We had to accept them helplessly.”
“WBSBCL started functioning on August 10, 2017, and everything was initially normal. But, institutional corruption began on August 13, 2021,” said a bottler from central Bengal, requesting anonymity.
A total of 36 bottlers were allegedly threatened and extorted by distributors in association with influential political leaders, led by Abhishek Banerjee.
A few bottlers drew the short stick when they refused to accept the new regime of extortion. One such was IFB Agro Industries Limited, with a plant in South 24-Parganas district. The plant was attacked, vandalised and shut down allegedly by Jahangir Khan, a close aide of Abhishek Banerjee. Khan was arrested on Monday at the Indo-Nepal border. He was the lynchpin of the infamous ‘Diamond Harbour Model’ and had contested the 2026 Assembly election on a TMC ticket from Falta.
IFB fought hard against them and finally reopened the plant following a High Court order.
“When I protested, I too had to face problems,” Agarwal told The Statesman.
According to bottlers, under the policy introduced in 2017, WBSBCL used to earn a 1.5 per cent margin on the wholesale distribution of liquor after receiving liquor products from bottlers.
“But, significantly, after a minor alteration of the policy in 2021, distributors became entitled to an additional 1.5 per cent profit margin,” said a bottler, adding, “The West Bengal Government has suffered revenue losses since distributors started earning the additional 1.5 per cent profit margin.”
“Just calculate the profit margin at the rate of 1.5 per cent on the present revenue of Rs 23,000 crore. How much have the distributors earned and how much revenue has the government lost?” he added.
“Not only that, violating the earlier operating system, distributors forcibly started collecting transportation, loading and unloading expenses from the bottlers from 2022. It hampered our business,” said another bottler.
“After the change of guard in West Bengal, the situation is normal now, but we will welcome a policy under which WBSBCL itself starts functioning by abolishing the distributor system, which acts as a middleman,” said Choudhury of the Monalisa Bottling Plant. UNI XC SSP