Another feather in Odisha Excise Department’s cap; wins President’s award

Bhubaneswar (TF Bureau): With Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik’s 5T initiatives, Odisha Excise Department has become an example for the nation. Its achievements are being recognized at the national level. Under the leadership of the able administrator Ashish Kumar Singh, Excise Department got the prestigious Gold Medal for the Digital Initiatives in Ease of Doing Business Category at the Digital Business Awards presented by President Droupadi Murmu recently.

The Department has been in the forefront in adopting technology and e-Abkari. Earlier, the Department had received the prestigious Skoch Award for adoption of the e-Abkari.

The Odisha Excise Department is leading from the front in terms of enforcement. With quality intelligence gathering network along with continuous and rigorous enforcement works, record number of cases have been detected and huge quantity of seizures have been made by the Odisha Excise Department.

Till December 2022, the Department had detected 45541 Excise/NDPS cases as against the 29038 cases detected up to December 2021. A significant 56 percent increase was registered as compared to last year. Also, a record number of 1310 cases were detected under the NDPS Act till December against 575 in the last year, showing an increase of 127 percent.

Speaking about the Department’s successes, Excise Commissioner Ashish Singh says that “Adoption of 5T Initiatives in each and every section of the department is our priority. It has helped in streamlining the administrative mechanism and enhancing the enforcement activities. Use of technology has led to transparency in our work. We hope to further enhance our efficiency in the coming days.”

Due to the use of Information Technology, the Department has been able to achieve record performance. With the assistance of the National Informatics Center (NIC), at present, 40 modules have been developed to provide the best practices to the stakeholders like Label Registration (New, Renewal & Modification), Renewal of Shops, Grant of ON Shop License, All NOCs with Permit Pass, Management of Spirit in the M & TP, Distillery and Bottling Units, e-Lottery module for IMFL OFF & CL Shops, Supplier/ Brand owner registration, Temporary Bar License, Daily Enforcement, Criminal Case Information System, Shifting and Transfer of Shops, Grant of Letter of Intent, e-Abkari Support System, Mahua Flower Storage and Sale License, Mahua Accounting, Serious Irregularity Report, Daily Prevention Raid System etc., as a process of implementing 5T in the Department.

The eLOTTERY module has been the most important module for the Department. In 2022, the Department successfully conducted lottery for settlement of total 1436 Excise Shops (1163 IMFL OFF Shops, 222 CL Shops, 11 Premium FL OFF Shops and unsettled 37 OS Shops) in the State with technology support through e-Abkari portal in a transparent manner.

The Excise Department is one of the sources of revenue generation for the government. During the year 2021-22, the department ensured record collection of Excise revenue of Rs.7683.9 crore including VAT through regular monitoring of lifting position, supply chain management and vigorous enforcement measures in comparison to the previous year.

Till December 2022, Rs 6197.54 crore had been collected as against Rs 5023.92 crore during the corresponding period of 2021 with an increase of 23.36 percent.

The Excise Department has taken up a massive infrastructure overhaul for the department offices. All offices are being modernized with state-of-the-art facilities. While 107 buildings projects have been taken up, 43 of them have been completed.

It has also deployed 140 vehicles in different offices for enforcement activities. Vehicles for better enforcement have been provided to all ranges for mobile parties, squads and in the coming days all excise stations will have dedicated vehicles.

For better functioning of the department and to curb the excise and narcotics crimes, the Government has created 791 posts in last two years. The Department has also taken up capacity enhancement of its personnel through training programs. Training modules for all officers have been started in-house and regular organised training will start at the Biju Patnaik State Police Academy from next March.