Orders reserved on pleas challenging TASMAC’s tender notice

Among the petitions was one by K Shanmugam, challenging the tender notice for grant of bar licence, which among others imposed a condition that applicants had to quote three per cent or above on the actual sale of liquor as licence fee for running the bar. Justice T S Sivagnanam reserved the orders after hearing arguments by various counsels for the petitioners. Shanmugam’s counsel said he was an existing licence holder for a bar here to sell eatables only and to collect empty bottles in its premises and had been duly paying the licence fee up to date.

Meanwhile, a November 3, 2017 TASMAC notice called for tenders for the grant of bar licence for the period from December 1, 2017 to November 30, 2018 with certain conditions. One of it was that the applicant has to quote 3 per cent or above on the actual sale for Oct 2017 as advance demand amount, which would be the licence fee for December 2017 and for every month thereafter, he submitted. The petitioner contended that it was highly impossible to pay a minimum of three per cent on actual sales as licence fee since all buyers don’t enter the bar and don’t consume liquor inside it. He also submitted that the collection of empty bottles also does not match with the actual sales in wine shops. 

Stating that every now and then, TASMAC increases the price of liquor, the counsel said the price of eatables and empty bottles do not increase at all. Therefore, the condition that the licensee should pay a minimum of 3 per cent on the sales of previous month is an arbitrary one, he contended. 

Further, the petitioner stated that the licensee is not authorised to collect Goods and Services Tax (GST) and said the condition that the licensee has to pay a GST at 18 per cent is also an arbitrary one.