A tandoori take-away and restaurant won its bid for a new premises licence that covers alcohol sales.

March Tandoori in St Peter’s Road had its application approved by a licensing panel at Fenland District Council.

Committee chairman Mike Humphrey announced the agreement following the hearing.

Owner Addy Ahmed, who took over the business last year, had until now been operating the restaurant side with outdoor seating.

“Ever since we took over management, we always had this vision of providing a very safe and enjoyable eat-in experience for all customers,” he said.

“But it all went south when Covid happened.”

So, he created open air decking with food, desserts, ice creams, mixed grills and alcohol free mocktails.

Now he can expand on that with the granting of a new premises licence.

Some changes have been agreed with police about operating times but the panel dismissed objections raised, initially, by 14 residents.

That number dropped to nine, but Cllr Humphrey noted that no one had come forward to raise their objection personally at the hearing.

He said the nine objections that remained covered areas outside of licensing regulation.

These include objections on planning, narrow roads, alleged anti-social behaviour, cars arriving late at night and parking.

He said they “fall outside the remit of this committee”.

Cllr Humphrey said the committee had agreed to grant the licence subject to the external decking area not serving alcohol after 10.30 and the restaurant inside to close at midnight.