Can you beat thisIJ A Delhi-based businessman ran an illegal brewery for over two decades and sold high-end popular liquor brands of foreign make to farmhouse owners of Mehrauli, Chhattarpur, Fatehpur Beri and Sultanpur.
The owner used to supply only when orders were booked in advance. He had managed to convince his customers that he imports these brands for his customers. From Vodka to Blue label Scotch, you name it and the owner had it.
However, he had his luck run out this week when a connoisseur of foreign liquor smelt a rat as the so-called branded liquor tasted differently. He alerted the officials of the Excise Intelligence Bureau (EIB) of the Delhi Government. The EIB team led by Inspector Vandana Rao arrested Ashwin lamba, owner of the liquor factory, and his assistant
Rattan Singh on Tuesday night. The premises of the illegal plant have been sealed. Six cases of foreign brands, perfumes and colour used for making the “fake” branded liquor have also been recovered.
What has amazed the EIB officials is the brazen manner this brewery had functioned unchallenged for the past 20 years. Its owner Ashwin lamba, a resident of Old Rajinder Nagar in Central Delhi, used his deep connections in the Delhi Police and the Excise department of the
Delhi Government to carry on with his illegal business situated at D-207, Gali no 7, E block behind Chhattarpur temple. “The role of local policemen needs to be investigated as it was not possible for lamba to run such a unit without the active connivance of the police,” said an official who was part of the raid.
As a matter of fact, lamba also runs a jewellery shop in Karol Bagh and had camouflaged his furtive activities so well and nobody doubted his real business.
Top sources in EIB told The Pioneer that the factory was being run for the past 20 years and they concocted the flavour and colour of highly expensive foreign liquor brands such as Chivas Regal Blue label, Black label, Glenfiddich Green label, Gold label, AbsoluT Vodka, Piper Heldsick Champagne. In a bid to escape suspicion, they used to supply only to parties in farm houses and star hotels on Mehrauli-Gurgaon road.
During the preliminary investigation, it was revealed that they used to get a profit between Rs 10,000 and Rs 20,000 on each bottle, depending on the cost of the brand. During the raid, total 40 bottles of foreign liquor of various brands, 72 bottles of IMFl (for sale in Delhi), 300 empty bottles, 2,000 caps of bottles of various brands of foreign liquor and raw materials i.e., coloured bottles, perfume bottles, refilled bottles, 10,000 labels/stickers and cartons of various brands of foreign liquors were recovered from the premises.