Chennai: Amid facing huge loss following the closure of more than 3,000 liquor shops along the highways following a Supreme Court order, the Tamil Nadu Government has proposed to denotify these stretches so that it would come under the purview of municipal corporations.

Though the State Government, in its communique, did not specify that the order is for re-opening the liquor outlets once the highways are denotified, Tamil Nadu Municipal Administration claimed that the move would help the Government carry out various civic works along those roads immediately without waiting for Centre’s permission.

Tamil Nadu’s road network comes to about 1.9 lakh km, out of which about 14,000 km is classified as National and State highways on the basis of traffic activities and connectivity.

“It has been proposed to shift the highways under the control of municipalities so that various civic works including water and sewage pipe laying operations along the highways especially during calamity could be carried out immediately without waiting to get permission from various State and Central government departments”, Municipal Administration Commissioner K. Prakash said in the order.

According to him, the move would not only reduce the time of works but also reduce the cost to the exchequer. The order also asked the respective district corporations to pass a resolution in this regard before April 25, 2017.

Tamil Nadu government, which controls the liquor business in the State, is in the verge of losing more than Rs 10,000 crore from the closure of about 3,400 liquor shops along the highways following the recent Supreme Court order even as the authorities will be facing difficulty to spend for freebies as it was mostly managed from the
liquor sales.

Also, more than 20,000 people working in TASMAC outlets and its bars would go jobless. Adding to the woes, the authorities across the State facing stiff opposition from the public when they attempted to shift the liquor shops inside the city.

Apart from the government, owners of the hotels and restaurants situated in the State along the highways are also facing huge financial loss as they were forced to shut their bars.

Reacting to the denotification order, political parties in the State including PMK, which is urging the government to declare dry State, claimed it was just a “guise” for helping liquor trade which is a major source of income.