The Hindu : 'Mizoram lottery scheme lacks transparency'

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Thursday, Nov 21, 2002

Southern States

Southern States - Tamil Nadu

'Mizoram lottery scheme lacks transparency'

By A. Subramani

CHENNAI NOV. 20. The State Government has opposed tooth and nail the move to curtail the police and other enforcement authorities from initiating action against errant agents of other State lotteries, saying: "There is a prima facie evidence that a very big racket is going on in the State, and the provisions of the Lotteries Regulation Act are misused, and several innocent people are being cheated''.

Coming down heavily on the Mizoram Government's lottery scheme, a counter-affidavit filed in the Madras High Court, said it lacked transparency and "Mizoram has no control over printing of the tickets''.

It said there was no budget allotment by Mizoram for the payment of prize money to the winners or payment of bonus to agents or printing charges of lottery tickets or advertisements. "The State appoints agents who pay a fixed royalty and they conduct the lottery on their own without any control by the State. As per the Act, the proceeds of the sale should be credited into public account of the State, and the State itself should conduct the draws'', it said.

Even though the tickets are more than six-digit numbers, they are really single digit lotteries having daily draws, in violation of the provisions of the Lotteries Regulation Act.

The Crime Branch, which has arrested 31 persons and registered 12 cases, said it had evidence to prove that the deciding factor in the seized lotteries was only a single digit.

"The shop-keeper writes two numbers, one in big size and the other in small size. The big size is the winning number'', it added.

Stating that the authorities were not interfering with any lawful business of lottery agents, it said, "if the authorities get information that if, under the guise of running a lottery, irregularities were being committed, the right of the authorities to investigate the offences should not be curtailed by any order of the court''.

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