The State Excise Intelligence Bureau (EIB) on Sunday evening bust an illicit liquor manufacturing unit in Bangalore and arrested one Suresh who was running it.

The EIB raided house no 93, Horamavu, K R Puram and seized 45 litres of rectified spirit, 35.29 litres of duplicate Indian Made Liquor (IML), empty bottles, cartons and labels of some top IML brands from the house.

“We were looking for Suresh alias Bal Kumar alias Damodar in a case we had booked against him in April. We had seized 423 litres of duplicate IML being smuggled in a vehicle in KR Puram. We arrested the driver and he confessed the contraband belonged to Suresh,” said State EIB Joint Commissioner H P Eerappa.

Along with the seized liquor, the EIB sleuths also sealed an illegal liquor manufacturing unit and a water tank in which Suresh used to mix rectified spirit with water.

On Monday morning, the EIB staff seized 30 litres of rectified spirit, bottles filled with distilled water, empty bottles and a hand-bottling machine, from a tempo traveller near Lingarajpuram.

“The seized items belong to one Suresh alias Channapa. We have taken him into custody. In all these cases, we found rectified spirit was smuggled from Maharashtra and Goa,” said Mr Eerappa.

On Sunday, the EIB arrested Kengeri Nagaraj from his house in Kengeri for his alleged involvement in the illegal storage and transportation of rectified spirit. “We had seized 210 litres of spirit on April 23 this year in Kengeri. The same day, we seized 2,480 litres of neutral spirit from a warehouse on Magadi Road. Both belonged to Nagaraj,” said Mr Thimma Reddy, excise sub-inspector. Nagaraj was wanted in four cases of smuggling and storage of rectified spirit and illicit liquor.

Giving details of seizures of rectified spirit and illicit liquor since the arrack ban in State, Mr Eerappa said in all, 1,151 cases have been booked by the Excise department. “We have seized 6,26,335 litres of arrack, 11,900 litres of toddy, 20,320 litres of IML and 49,467 litres of arrack in July and August. The total worth of seized items is Rs 8.50 crore,” he added.