India has a peculiar relationship with its middle classes. While the government is largely run by people from the middle classes, most government 'schemes' are aimed at the masses - one of the key charges levelled at United Progressive Alliance-II was that it was "not middle-class friendly".
Nowhere is that love-hate relationship personified more than in wine. Consider this:
n What should have been the "Indian Wine Board" is called the "Indian Grape Processing Board" as our worthies deemed it was not acceptable to use the W-word in a government-sponsored body.
n Wine comes under the ministry of food processing industries, but since rules for the production and sale of all alcoholic beverages (including wine) are framed by states, the ministry's role is largely restricted to doling out subsidies for new wineries (most of which are now lying closed).
n The manuals of most state excise departments did not include a separate section on 'wine' till very recently, and most still do not define wine as such. Perhaps since wine contributes a very small amount to the state coffers, it is not considered a category worth the trouble.
Wines are, of course, hugely expensive in India and reducing customs duties on imported wines would signal a change in attitudes by the new government.
The basic customs duty on wine is currently 150 per cent, which, after including additional levies, works out to 163 per cent - one of the highest rates anywhere in the world. This is the key reason why imported wines cost so much here. But proposals for a reduction in these duties are met with indifference ("too small a matter"), disdain ("will benefit only the middle class"), or knee-jerk protectionism ("what will happen to the Indian wine industry?").
The answer, of course, is to revert to an updated version of the three-slab duty system in force till mid-2007, keeping duties the same (150 per cent) on the lowest price slab, and reducing these to, say, 100 per cent on the highest slab. Doing this would serve several objectives: continue to afford protection to the domestic industry; ensure customs revenue does not fall; lower the prices of better (and more expensive) wines; and, of course, partly meet the demands of the European Union for tariff reduction. The slab-wise duties could be progressively reduced annually so that over time, the duty rates are on par with other food items.
This is what I've suggested to the revenue department in the ministry of finance in my individual capacity as a wine expert and consultant. Let's see what reaction (if any) this evokes.
Wines I've been drinking: Several wines, actually, at The Wine Connoisseurs' dinner at Sanctum, Bangalore. We started with a Champagne Mumm Cordon Rouge Brut, a classic champagne - aromas of peach and pineapple, with a fresh crisp taste, yeasty/bready, with some earthy notes and a rounded finish.
Then there was the Brancaia TRE, a 'baby super-Tuscan' made from three grapes (80 per cent Sangiovese, 10 per cent Merlot, 10 per cent Cabernet) from three different vineyards - a complex and medium-bodied wine with an aroma of berries, flowers and tobacco that did wonders for the second course.
Last (but not least) was a Palacio del Conde Gran Reserva 2006, from a 100-year-old winery in the Rioja area of Spain, made from the Tempranillo grape (naturally) - a smooth and complex red wine with some interesting berry aromas and rounded oaky tannins.
Sante, cin cin, and salud.
Alok Chandra is a Bangalore-based wine consultant
