1. The petitioners in these two writ petitions, who are manufacturers and sellers of foreign liquor in India, have filed these two writ petitions claiming relief to declare that the process of procurement of liquor in the State is arbitrary, non-transparent and vague, as it has conferred unguided and unbridled discretion on respondents No.2 and 3 in the process of procurement of liquor. The petitioners have also prayed for issuance of a direction to the respondents to fix and prescribe relevant criteria and to state a fair and transparent process for the procurement of liquor in the State on the basis of actual demand of products in the State with a further prayer to lift the products of the petitioner in accordance with the corresponding consumption for the relevant months in the financial year 2016-17 and also claimed further relief to declare that the officers of respondent No.2 cannot act as ex officio officers of respondent No.3 restraining the officers of respondent No.2 from working as officers of respondent No.3, and lastly a direction to publish in the official website of respondent No.3, on a real time basis, the data of the existing stock levels of products of the petitioner across the State.

Petitioner's case:

2. To substantiate the aforesaid reliefs, it is the case of the petitioners that they are renowned and reputed leading manufacturers and sellers of foreign liquor in India. Their brands include McDowell No.1 Whisky, Royal Challenge Whisky, Black Dog Whisky, Signature Whisky, Bagpiper Whisky, Smirnoff, Black & White Scotch, VAT-69 Scotch and Celebration Rum. Apart from these, the petitioners also sell all variants of Johnnie Walker. They were selling foreign liquor in the State in previous years also. Prior to 1st of April, 2017, retail outlets for liquor were privately owned and operated. However, on and from 1st of April, 2017, control and operation of all retail outlets of liquor was taken over by respondent No.3 and pursuant to the aforesaid change in the policy, petitioner No.1 in W.P.(C)No.1060/2018 entered into an agreement on 16-3-2017 with respondent No.4 for sale of foreign liquor. Since the agreement was valid up to 31-3-2018, a new agreement has been entered into between the aforesaid parties for sale of foreign liquor for the financial year 2018-19. It is the further case of the petitioners that prior to introduction of respondent No.3 as the exclusive licensee for retail sale in the State of Chhattisgarh on and from 1st of April, 2017, there was a significant demand for petitioner No.1's products, which enjoyed significant market share. There has been a drastic and significant fall in the sales of petitioner No.1's products in the financial year 2017-18 once respondent No.3 was introduced as exclusive licensee for retail sale of liquor in the State, in comparison to the sales of previous years when retail outlets were privately owned and operated. It is further pleaded that in stark contrasts, sales of certain select local manufacturers and suppliers have witnessed massive and unprecedented growth, with some of them achieving growth of 3984%, 1925% and 884% on a year to year comparison of annual sales. It is the pointed stand of the petitioners that the aforesaid fall in petitioner No.1's sales has been caused by the discriminatory practices adopted by respondents No.2 and 3 in the process of procurement of liquor from respondent No.4 for the purposes of retail sales at the retail outlets across the State of Chhattisgarh and such discriminatory practices are being followed as neither the Chhattisgarh Excise (Settlement of Licenses for Retail Sale of Country-Made/Foreign Liquor) Rules, 2017 (for short, 'the Rules of 2017') nor the annual Excise Policy framed by the respondents provide for the manner or basis on which respondents No.2 and 3 are to raise demands on respondent No.4 for various products of various suppliers for the purposes of supply for retail sale, as the Rules and Excise Polic