Chilled beer? Buy peanuts in Punjab
Beer for peanuts? Well not exactly but liquor contractors out to make a whole lot of cash while the sun scorches across Punjab insist on handing out a pack of roasted peanuts with every bottle of the super strong brew. It’s a marketing exercise that will have all the yuppie corporate whizkids chewing their nails.
Contractors across several Malwa (southwestern) districts have forged an informal (illegal?) monopoly to charge Punjab’s thirsty tipplers a neat Rs 30 over the usual Rs 55 price of a beer bottle. In fact the rates are flexible and actually vary with the soaring summer temperatures. “Sales are brisk on the hottest days when drinkers are willing to pay just about anything for a chilled bottle of beer,” said a liquor vend sales clerk in Moga. “The odd rainy day is usually bad news.”
The liquor monopoly has also upped the prices of other spirits but vend operators say the real money is in the beer. “Any brand will do just as long as it is super strong and has the kick of a wild stallion,” said a Morinda-based contractor who has built a veritable empire on liquor but remains a teetotaler. A packet is a mandatory buy with every bottle charged at anything from twice to three times the price at the local confectionery.
“The thekawallahs (sales clerk) flatly refuse to sell beer unless I also purchase peanuts,” complained Amritpreet Singh, a man who loves his beer but has ended up with a year’s supply of monkey nuts!
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