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A employee stands stands within the manufacturing facility the place beer is produced at Murree Brewery on Nov. 29, 2025 in Rawalpindi, Pakistan.
Betsy Joles for NPR
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Betsy Joles for NPR
RAWALPINDI, Pakistan — Inside Murree Brewery’s manufacturing facility, green-and-red cans transfer down a conveyor belt to get crammed with frothy golden beer. Each month, greater than 1 million cans are produced within the firm’s industrial brick buildings on this metropolis close to Pakistan’s capital Islamabad, and are ready for distribution across the nation.
Alcohol is banned for Pakistan’s Muslim majority, however remains to be consumed. Murree Brewery has operated inside this paradox for many years. It is the oldest and best-known brewery within the nation — based within the nineteenth century by the British throughout their colonial rule of India and bought by a household in Pakistan in 1947, the yr the brand new nation was created by way of India’s partition. Now, after an almost 50-year export ban, Murree is transport beer abroad once more.
Although little-known outdoors South Asia, the corporate is a family identify in Pakistan, says Ali Akbar Khan, creator of Rawul Pindee: The Raj Years, which chronicles the brewery’s historical past. “It is a landmark,” he says.
Cans of beer transfer down a manufacturing line on the Murree Brewery manufacturing facility on Nov. 29, 2025, in Rawalpindi, Pakistan. The brewery is owned by a Parsi household that acquired it after Pakistan’s creation in 1947.
Betsy Joles for NPR
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Betsy Joles for NPR
The brewery survived a prohibition imposed in 1977 by then-Prime Minister Zulfikar Ali Bhutto and tightened by the navy dictator who overthrew him, Gen. Muhammad Zia-ul-Haq, who imposed lashing as punishment for consuming alcohol. There have been exceptions for gross sales to non-Muslims and foreigners, and Murree Brewery was allowed to proceed working in Pakistan — however to not resume exporting alcoholic merchandise because it had earlier than the 1977 ban.
“The speculation behind the export ban was that an Islamic nation shouldn’t be seen as exporting a vice,” says Murree Brewery’s CEO Isphanyar Bhandara, whose grandfather acquired the brewery in 1947.
His household is a part of the nation’s tiny Parsi minority, the descendants of Persian Zoroastrians — a big issue of their potential to function a profitable brewery in an Islamic republic for 3 generations.
Isphanyar Bhandara, the Murree Brewery’s CEO and member of the Nationwide Meeting of Pakistan, took over the family-owned enterprise in 2008.
FAROOQ NAEEM/AFP by way of Getty Pictures
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FAROOQ NAEEM/AFP by way of Getty Pictures
The nation’s minority teams — together with Hindus and Christians — are allowed to buy restricted quantities of alcohol with official permits. Alcoholic drinks additionally discover their technique to Muslims who purchase them by way of countrywide bootlegging networks and casual liquor retailers within the southern province of Sindh.
An indication for Murree Brewery with the yr of its founding in the course of the British colonial period is outdoors the manufacturing facility the place beer and different drinks are produced in Rawalpindi, Pakistan.
Betsy Joles for NPR
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Betsy Joles for NPR
Bhandara’s father, Minocher Bhandara, who held a seat in Pakistan’s parliament and served as minority affairs adviser to Zia, lobbied the federal government for years for permission for Murree Brewery to export. Isphanyar Bhandara did the identical when he took over the enterprise after his father’s loss of life in 2008. (He too serves as a member of parliament). The brewery, for a short while within the early 2000s, entered partnerships with breweries that produced Murree-branded beer in Austria and the Czech Republic, and mentioned an analogous setup with a brewery in India across the identical time, however that deal did not materialize.
Earlier than the export ban, Murree Brewery shipped its alcohol to nations together with India, america and even Afghanistan. However it wasn’t till final yr that the corporate once more acquired the inexperienced mild to immediately ship merchandise overseas, after a 2022 change to Pakistan’s export coverage permitting alcohol exports to nations that aren’t a part of the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation, a bloc of 57 nations with important Muslim populations.
Cans of beer transfer on a manufacturing line on the Murree Brewery. Alcohol is banned for Pakistan’s Muslim majority, however is consumed by non-Muslims and foreigners.
Betsy Joles for NPR
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Betsy Joles for NPR
The long-awaited string of presidency approvals that adopted have been met with cautious optimism at Murree Brewery.
“Initially, we weren’t assured that all the issues will go easy,” says Ramiz Shah, the corporate’s export supervisor.
However to date, so good. The brewery despatched its first cargo of beer — to the UK — final spring to check out the export course of, after which made exports to Portugal and Japan. It’s now trying to develop its worldwide gross sales to different markets, together with america and Canada.
A employee with packing containers in Murree Brewery’s beer manufacturing facility in Rawalpindi, Pakistan. Each month, greater than 1 million cans are packaged within the firm’s industrial brick buildings in Rawalpindi and ready for distribution across the nation.
Betsy Joles for NPR
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Betsy Joles for NPR
Bhandara credit the federal government’s change of coronary heart on exports to economics: Pakistan can acquire much-needed income from these abroad offers. “The federal government advantages if we export,” Bhandara explains.
There are solely round 9 million non-Muslims in Pakistan — lower than 4% of a inhabitants of some 250 million — creating severe home market limitations for a producer of alcohol.
Staff within the Murree Brewery manufacturing facility the place alcoholic drinks are produced in Rawalpindi, Pakistan.
Betsy Joles for NPR
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Betsy Joles for NPR
Murree Brewery expanded its choices through the years to incorporate non-alcoholic drinks, together with juices, bottled water and fruit-flavored malt drinks — a few of that are exported. Shah, the export supervisor, says the primary distributors within the U.Okay. and Japan to purchase Murree’s beer have been already importing among the firm’s non-alcoholic choices. Since 2020, Murree Brewery has exported alcohol-free merchandise to greater than a dozen nations world wide. Shah says relationships with these distributors open a window for potential beer gross sales, too: “They’re straightforward to focus on as a result of they know us.”
A employee stands within the manufacturing facility the place beer is produced at Murree Brewery on Nov. 29, 2025 in Rawalpindi, Pakistan.
Betsy Joles for NPR
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Betsy Joles for NPR
Murree Brewery now has some competitors domestically from the Chinese language-run Hui Coastal Brewery and distillery, which began manufacturing in Pakistan’s Balochistan province in 2021. However Murree nonetheless managed its finest yr on document in 2025, surpassing $100 million in annual income.
Khan, the creator, credit this success to the technique and foresight of the Bhandara household through the years. “They’re very shrewd businessmen and I feel it was a enterprise deal of a lifetime,” he says of their acquisition of the brewery after India’s partition.
For now, the brewery would not need to crank up manufacturing to satisfy export calls for. Bhandara is hoping which may change, although he stays keenly conscious of his context.
“We have been all the time introduced up with this idea: to not develop the brewery, to not enhance the capability. Maintain your head down. There may be an Islamic nation,” he says. “We do not wish to be seen as flexing our muscle groups whereas producing liquor… That’s one thing we do not do.”
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