A day after the Assam cabinet decided to hike the prices of Indian-made foreign liquor by 25 per cent, shops were shut down on Saturday to enable retailers to change the price stickers.

Sources said that since there has been a sudden change in prices, the shops were closed on Saturday to avoid any confusion among the customers.

According to a notification by the state excise department, the retail vendors are not allowed to sell or lift any excise product till the new MRP was registered by the department and duly notified.

All superintendents of excise have been asked to ensure the accounting of stock with details of existing brands and MRP.

Along with this, the retailers have been directed to pay additional excise duty and value-added tax (VAT) for the stock under their possession through the treasury challan online portal, for which the demand notice shall be issued by the excise official concerned with intimation to the commissioner of excise.

The wholesale warehouse licensees will be pasting new MRP stickers masking the old stickers on the existing bottles, which might take a day or two, according to a source.

According to the source, the entire process will take at least two days but it was hoped the retail liquor shops would open for business by Monday.

After the cabinet meeting on Friday, industry minister Chandra Mohan Patowary told reporters that liquor price was increased with an aim to earn Rs 1,000 crore additionally in a year. Liquor is one of the major sources of revenue for the state government. After the reopening of liquor shops, the state government had earned Rs 50 crore to Rs 70 crore from an estimated sale of liquor worth Rs 150 crore in eight days.