India is having a few beers too many

India is the strangest place to build a craft beer brewing business. We don’t drink a lot of beer. Never have. Our thing is spirits; anything that does the job quickly. Well, not if you were to ask Simba. Or maybe Bira. Damn right, but wherever is Simba?

Launched in 2016, Raipur-based craft beer brand Simba has, so far, largely been limited to smaller towns and cities

In the past three months, it ventured into the metros for the first time, launching in Delhi, Gurugram and Bengaluru, where it faces fierce competition

Amid a declining beer market, the premium segment (which includes craft beer) has been a bright spot

Bottled craft beer is an increasingly crowded category, dominated by B9 Beverages' Bira, as a bevy of Indian brands look to get in on the action

Nobody goes to Assam to sell craft beer. The state in the north-eastern part of India is best known for tea gardens, beautiful wildlife and nothing much else.

Except, Prabhtej Bhatia did.

Bhatia is 27. Dressed in a casual violet tee and jeans, and a black turban. It is evident he comes from privilege. The gateway to his house in Raipur falls slightly short of F. Scott Fitzgerald’s Gatsby mansion. His family owns multiple businesses in Raipur, Chhattisgarh—restaurants, schools, fisheries and liquor manufacturing and bottling. We are travelling together in his Hyundai Santa Fe, an SUV sold by the Korean car company in India, and not sold very much.

AUTHOR

Harveen Ahluwalia

In her last assignment, Harveen was at Mint, the business daily published by HT Media. At Mint, where she spent about two years, she wrote stories on retail, food and the media business. Harveen is a B.Com (H) graduate from Shri Ram College of Commerce, University of Delhi. She has a diploma in journalism from the Times School of Journalism. Like many folks at The Ken, Harveen talks and tweets a lot. When she isn’t writing or reading, she likes to sketch and doodle. She can be reached at harveen at the-ken dot com.

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