Confirming that a liquor ban would put in place in Madhya Pradesh, the state's Finance Minister Jayant Malaiya said that no timeline has been decided so far.
"We are first trying to educate people about the harm that is caused by alcohol," he said.
Malaiya said there is no target on the number of shops that the state government plans to shut.
He said the government had come to the decision of banning liquor shops after the Supreme Court recently directed shutting sale of alcohol near the highways across the country, he told CNBC-TV18 in an interview.
The state government has for now merely shifted the liquor stores to locations that are at least 500 metres away from the highway, he said.
The state's Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan had earlier in the day announced that all liquor shops would be closed across the state in a phased manner.
"Alcohol prohibition will be implemented in the entire state by closing all liquor shops in a phased manner," Chouhan announced while addressing a programme at village Neemkhera (Heerapur) of Narsinghpur district.
"In the first phase, the state government closed all the shops falling within a radius of five kilometers from the banks of river Narmada on either side. In the next phase, the liquor shops would not be allowed to open in residential localities, near educational institutes or religious places," he had said.
Chouhan reiterated that a de-addiction drive would also be launched in the state.
During the past one month, several protests against the liquor shops have been reported from across the state.
With inputs from PTI.
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