The Sampadak Express News Desk
Festival-led stocking for Dasara pushed liquor depot supplies in Telangana past ₹2,000 crore within the first 19 days of October, with overall supplies up 37.02% and beer volumes rising nearly 41%, according to daily figures shared by the Telangana Excise Department and reported by The Hindu.
Data for October 1–19 show depots supplied liquor worth ₹2,054.51 crore, up from ₹1,499.46 crore during the corresponding period in 2025—an increase of ₹555.05 crore. The build-up was most visible just before the festival: October 19 alone accounted for ₹303.40 crore in supplies, compared with ₹33.64 crore on the same date last year, an 801.90% jump. Officials attributed the unusually high percentage change in part to differences in the festival calendar across the two years.
Product-wise, beer moved faster than Indian Made Foreign Liquor (IMFL). Cumulative IMFL supplies for October 1–19 reached 18.38 lakh cases versus 14.16 lakh cases last year, up 29.80%. Beer supplies rose from 21.55 lakh cases to 30.37 lakh cases, an increase of 40.93%. The department noted the figures reflect stock flowing from depots to retailers ahead of peak demand and do not establish how much of that inventory was sold to consumers.
Single-day stocking figures on October 19 underline the surge. IMFL supplies reached 2.72 lakh cases on the day, compared with 0.30 lakh cases on the corresponding date last year. Beer supplies were 4.25 lakh cases, sharply higher than 0.52 lakh cases on the same date in 2025, the data show.
The daily trajectory illustrates how momentum built as Dasara neared. The department’s ledger shows that by October 3 this year, depot supplies had climbed to ₹144.10 crore; the comparable date last year saw no depot movement because of Dasara, making a direct percentage comparison impossible. On October 5, this year’s supplies touched ₹176.43 crore against ₹50.21 crore last year, up 251.38%, followed by ₹104.43 crore on October 6 and ₹84.27 crore on October 7.
The acceleration was clearer in the second half of the month. On October 16, supplies totaled ₹126.32 crore compared with ₹68.93 crore last year, an 83.26% increase. A day later, on October 17, depots moved liquor worth ₹223.25 crore versus ₹89.28 crore the previous year, up 150.06%. By October 19, single-day supplies had risen to ₹303.40 crore, pushing cumulative dispatches comfortably beyond the ₹2,000-crore threshold.
Cumulative trends tracked the same pattern. As of October 7, depot supplies totaled ₹550.37 crore—only marginally higher than ₹549.38 crore recorded during the same period in 2025, a growth of 0.18%. By October 16, the cumulative figure had risen to ₹1,527.85 crore, up 24.99% year-on-year. On October 17, it stood at ₹1,751.07 crore, with year-on-year growth of 33.50%. After depots closed at 11 p.m. on October 19, cumulative October supplies reached ₹2,054.51 crore.
The department’s comparative series also notes that in 2025, October 1 depot sales stood at ₹41.14 crore, down 52.29% from ₹86.23 crore on the same date a year earlier, underscoring how festival timing can skew early-October baselines. The Dasara calendar shift is material for this year’s comparisons: while the festival fell on October 2 last year, it is being observed on October 20 this year, shifting the peak stocking window to later in the month.
Officials said the figures capture depot supplies routed to retail outlets in the run-up to Dasara and reflect pre-festival stocking behaviour by the trade. The latest totals were compiled after all depots closed on October 19 at 11 p.m., ahead of the October 20 festival observance.
