Radisson Blu fined for unregistered banquets

The Ranchi Municipal Corporation slapped a fine of Rs75,000 on five-star hotel Radisson Blu on Friday for operating three banquet halls allegedly without proper license for commercial use. The fine was slapped after Wednesday’s surprise raid conducted by a team of RMC officials led by Assistant Executive Officer, Ram Krishna Kumar.

The five-star hotel paid the penalty of `25,000 (fixed for each unauthorised establishment) for each banquet hall -- Iris, Emilia and Astor--- on the spot through cheques.“The hotel is running three banquet halls illegally. They were running without RMC’s permission. They did not take our notice seriously and flouted the norms,” said Kumar.

The civic body raided the premises of the plush hotel as a part of a drive to either shut commercial spaces in the city running without license or to regularise places which were out of the tax net of the RMC. A notice was issued by the municipal body seeking unauthorised commercial spaces to obtain permission to operate for a specific purpose by July 29.

The team also inspected two other hotels -- Hotel Raso situated at Birsa Chowk and Hotel Park Inn situated at Hatia -- however they were spared as their application for license was under process.Notably, the RMC had received 166 applications for registrations however according to estimates by officials of RMC between 150 to 200 establishments were expected to come forward with their application by the deadline of July 29. The RMC’s survey highlighted that around 120 lodges, 180 hostels, 73 banquet halls and 30 dharamshalas are doing business in the capital.

The RMC was irked at non-compliance of the order issued in this regard and also no actions on the part of hotels and lodge owners despite allowing several opportunities to get their establishment registered. As repeated warning did not bear fruit, the municipal body created raid squads to give momentum to the pace of registration.