The Supreme Court on Tuesday told States and Union Territories that all liquor vends situated within city limits along highway roads will not violate the Court's order banning liquor vends situated 500 metre from any State or National Highway.
Taking up a plea filed by a Chandigarh-based NGO Arrive Safe Society against the decision of Chadigarh administration to change the name of State highways to major district roads, the Bench headed by Chief Justice JS Khehar said that the order of the apex court will not be violated so long as the vends being given license to operate fall within city limits.
It gave nod to the Chandigarh administration's notification de-notifying some highways after observing that not all the 99 affected liquor vends on this road had been revived. Only 84 vends which fell within city limits received protection under the notification. The bench, also comprising Justices DY Chandrachud and lN Rao, observed that such a classification by the state was "reasonable" and will not be considered as violating the Court's order.
However, a detailed order will be passed by the Court on Wednesday after hearing the grievance of all states and UTs. The bench rejected a bunch of applications for modification filed by private liquor vends, clubs, hotels and bars as "non-maintainable" restricting the scope of relief only to states/UTs. Moreover, the Court observed that once a decision is taken on allowing vends within city limits, the issue at hand will be addressed to a great extent.
On March 31, the apex court had said that liquor vends within 500 metres of national and State highways will have to shut down from April 1. It had exempted the hill States of Sikkim, Meghalaya and Himachal Pradesh and areas having a population of up to 20,000.