Move to open bar in Guest House complex sparks off row

Berhampur: In what appears to be giving in to the liquor lobby, the Berhampur Municipal Corporation (BeMC) has decided to give permission to open a bar inside the Municipal Guest House complex owned by the civic body.

The BeMC had leased out the management of the Guest House and the adjoining Kalyan Mandap building, also owned by the civic body on the Town Hall Road, to a private party three years ago and also allowed the party to run a bar situated just behind the Guest House. The entrance of the bar is open towards the Kalyan Mandap.

The BeMC had disallowed the functioning of liquor and lottery business in any of its allotted rooms throughout the Silk City two years ago. The BeMC had even issued notices to the lease holders to stop selling liquor or receive cancellation orders. “But the move to allow a bar in the Municipal Guest House complex clearly exposes the unholy nexus between the bar owners and the BeMC”, alleged Pitabas Panda, a BJP leader and member of the State Bar Council.

The bar in Municipal Guest House complex and Kalyan Mandap nearby is situated a few metres away from Khallikote College thus flouting the foreign liquor rules.

Pitabas demanded that the BeMC must make public the conditions of the lease between the private party to manage the bar, Municipal Guest House and Kalyan Mandap. “Or else, we would knock on the door of the court of law,” he said.

The Municipal Guest House, with 28 rooms situated in a prime location, was built in 1961 when Basant Panigrahi was the Chairman of Berhampur Municipality. In 2016, the BeMC had planned to convert the Guest House into a multipurpose centre to make it economically viable. It had proposed to construct a four-storied building providing Disneyland for the kids, restaurant, shopping mall and merge Kalyan Mandap with Guest House at a cost of Rs 6 crore. But the plan was shelved subsequently.

Again in 2018, when K Madhavi was the Mayor, the BeMC proposed to build in public-private partnership (PPP) mode a G+5 floor commercial complex by demolishing the Municipal Guest House and the adjoining Kalyan Mandap. The ground floor was planned to be used for parking of vehicles, the first and second floors were exclusively to be used as a market, and the third floor as a food court. One complete floor was planned to be dedicated for the Guest House. The proposal was submitted in the council meeting of the BMC and it was endorsed unanimously on July 18, 2018.

In 2018, one restaurant in the Municipal Guest House was managed by a private party on the ground floor and one conference hall on the first floor. But these were closed. Earlier, the council meetings of the BeMC and many meetings of the private organisations were being held in this conference hall of the Municipal Guest House. But council meetings of the BeMC are now being held in the recently-built conference hall inside the BeMC office complex.