Popular restaurant caught serving fake Smirnoff vodka

A popular Indian restaurant was given a rap on the knuckles for serving vodka which was not the kind displayed on the bottle following a visit by the North Ayrshire Trading Standards department.

Davinder Summel of the Gulab Tandoori Brasserie in Stanecastle Road, Girdle Toll, appeared before the North Ayrshire Licensing Board on Wednesday.

Following a joint inspection involving the Home Office and Trading Standards on May 15, presumptive tests on two opened bottles displayed as Smirnoff No.21 Red Label Vodka 37.5% did not detect Diageo’s covert marker; a control test on an unopened bottle did. The open bottles were seized.

Diageo concluded that their contents were “not consistent with the genuine product”.

The measured alcohol strengths and conductivity were within the stated product specifications, and the substitute liquid was not identified.

Trading Standards asked the Board to consider suspension of the premises licence. Alternatively, it proposed the replacement of the designated premises manager and a requirement that all staff hold personal licences.

The Licensing Standards Officer made no specific recommendation as to the outcome.

The most recent pre-Board inspection took place on May 21, at which time the premises were found to be compliant. On each occasion, Mr Summel had taken advice on board and actively sought to rectify any issues identified.

Mr Summel’s agent Ian Hunter explained that his client had been involved in the running of the Gulab for three years and had worked there 16 years altogether.

He said that everything had been tested by Trading Standards, and the alcohol in the bottles did not appear to be Smirnoff.

There had been an inspection, he said, involving both immigration and Trading Standards, which he believed had been instigated by a “disgruntled” previous employee and that there had been a number of prank calls at the time of the incident.

Mr Summel said: “I can only assume that someone may have done it maliciously or someone has just been lazy and used what was on the bar.”

Mr Hunter insisted that Mr Summel had taken the matter very seriously and he had acted on advice given.

He had undertaken a refresher course on Tuesday, and his brother, who also worked there, had passed his personal licence test and was awaiting the issue of his licence from the Board. Three other members of staff were attending a Licensing course on August 25.

There could have been a mistake by a member of staff, and that was why steps were being taken to rectify the oversight.

Mr Summel added that from now on they would only be buying 1.5 litre bottles of Smirnoff in future and there would be no occasion where any topping up was required,

The premises, he added, were well run. There had been some doubt as to how the two bottles contained non-Smirnoff vodka in them.

Cllr Cameron Inglis proposed putting a warning letter on the premises licence, which would stay on for five years. This was seconded by Cllr Ronnie Stalker and unanimously agreed by the Board.