Tamil Nadu: Liquor shops to open in tomorrow; colour coded tokens for crowd management at outlets

Colour coded tokens, that specify the time and day of the week are ready for distribution to consumers to buy liquor at State-owned outlets set to open on Saturday as part of efforts to manage crowd and ensure social distancing.

The Supreme Court's order earlier on Friday paved the way for resumption of liquor salein Tamil Nadu through Tamil Nadu State Marketing Corporation retail vends.

As per the new arrangement, those seeking to buy liquor will have to gettoken first and only then they could make the purchase on the date and time specified, an office-bearer of a TASMACworkers association said here on Friday.

The liquor outlets start sales from tomorrow in non-containment areas, except in Chennai Police limits and Thiruvallur district limits, a press note said.

Shops would be open 10 a.m to 5 p.m and only 500 tokens would be issued to the public per day per shop, the release added.

Seven different colour-coded tokens have been readied to be provided to the people.

"Preparations for bringing out the tokens in seven colours including blue, green, navy blue, and violent began sufficiently in advance and tokens would be sent to all the outlets for distribution...approximately 500 persons will get the tokens on an average per day," said general secretary of TASMAC Workers AssociationD Dhanasekaran.

TASMAC shops, which reopened on May 7 had to close down operations the next day following an order of the Madras High Court which directed closure since guidelines like individual distancing were flouted.

The shops had opened after a 43-day dry spell on May 7 owing to the COVID-19 lockdown. On May 9, the state government had moved the Supreme Court challenging the Madras High Court order closing the shops.