India’s newest spirits: A ₹75 lakh Scotch, luxury vodka and a juniper-heavy gin

Balvenie Fifty

William Grant & Sons’ newest release is a 50-year-old Speyside single malt, the ‘Balvenie Fifty – First Edition’. Aged in a European oak refill butt filled in 1973, it promises “ripe berries on the nose along with deep oaky spice on the palate”. The whisky comes in a helix-shaped case made from seven layers of wood, accompanied by a 14-carat gold-plated brass display.

Only one bottle has come to India, priced at ₹75 lakh at G Town Wines in Gurugram.

More, relatively accessible Balvenie limited editions are also part of the Rare Marriages series: the Balvenie Thirty ( ₹4.3 lakh), aged in American and European oak casks, and the Twenty-Five ( ₹90,000), matured mainly in American oak ex-bourbon barrels with some spirit resting in larger European oak Oloroso puncheons, 500-litre casks that lend richer dried fruit and spice. The whiskies are then married in a tun, a large vat where flavours are allowed to harmonise before bottling.

The Spirit of Kashmyr & Cashmir Vodka

Luxury vodka appears to be making a comeback. Both Piccadily Agro, which produces Indri-Trini whisky, and Radico Khaitan Ltd., India’s largest vodka maker and famous for its Rampur single malts, recently unveiled white spirits coincidentally named after Kashmir.

Radico Khaitan’s The Spirit of Kashmyr is available in two expressions: a natural variant ( ₹2,500) and one infused with saffron ( ₹3,000).

Cashmir, on the other hand, uses Soni Moti, an ancient variety of emmer wheat, as its base grain. The vodka is distilled seven times and filtered five, a process designed to strip away impurities and produce a neutral, smooth spirit. It will be made in Karnal, Haryana, and is priced between ₹1,800 and ₹3,500 across the country.

Neoli Rum

Himmaleh Spirits, the Uttarakhand-based maker of Kumaon & I gin and Bandarful liqueur, has launched Neoli rum.

Distilled from fresh sugarcane juice in the agricole style—a French Caribbean tradition that gives rum a grassy, vegetal character—Neoli is also the first in India to be produced in a double retort pot still.

This Jamaican method, still employed at estates like Appleton, channels vapours through two chambers (“retorts”) to add depth and complexity. Bottled at 49% ABV, the rum is priced at ₹3,000 in Goa and ₹2,700 in Uttarakhand.

GianChand Adambaraa & Manshaa

Jammu-based GianChand’s new single malts have been picking up global recognition. Adambaraa, the distillery’s first unpeated whisky matured in bourbon casks, won big at the International Whisky Competition 2025 in Kentucky. Meanwhile, Manshaa was named the International Whisky of the Year at Meininger’s International Spirits Awards in Germany, with the jury noting its “long medicinal peat smoke” balanced by citrus and spice.

Both whiskies are priced at ₹9,500 at Hyderabad and Delhi Duty Free, and will shortly be available at retail in Haryana and Goa.

Greater Than Juniper Bomb

The Juniper Bomb, Greater Than’s once-limited edition gin, is now part of Goa-based Nao Spirits’ permanent lineup. First created in 2020 after a power cut stretched the usual 10-hour botanical soak to nearly 36, the accident produced a gin that was intensely juniper-forward and quickly won—according to the company—a following.

Compared to the original Greater Than, it uses about three times the juniper, giving it a bold London Dry profile with a finish of ripe lychees. The gin is priced at ₹1,450 in Goa, ₹1,700-2,000 in Haryana, and ₹2,400 in Maharashtra.