Friday, Jan 10, 2003
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Tamil Nadu
By Radha Venkatesan
``An interim stay is unwarranted at this stage,'' said the Chief Justice, B.Subhashan Reddy, when three bulk agents challenged the ban. The Advocate-General, N. R. Chandran, assured the court that the Government would work out a scheme to reimburse the public and the agents who bought tickets. In Tamil Nadu, where tickets worth Rs.14,215 crores were being sold every year, the blanket clampdown has left an estimated 25 lakh people including 60,000 agents in the business and lakhs of lottery buffs in dismay. Indeed, the Raffle department too is taken aback, as only on the eve of yesterday's ban did the Fisheries Minister, M. Radhakrishnan, launch its bumper draw, Ponmari, for this month. And, it sold 30 lakh tickets for daily draws even yesterday. Besides, at least, 40 lakh tickets for the Pongal bumper draw have already been sold. In all, 18, 777 draws were being held by both by Tamil Nadu-run and other State lotteries, and at least 12.3 crore tickets were sold daily. But, government officials insist that the ticket money would be refunded at any cost. The dealers of the Tamil Nadu Government-run raffles would be asked to refund the amount to the ``public'' on their producing the tickets. If the dealers fail to refund the amount, the Raffles department will step in to provide the ticket money from bank guarantees furnished by the agents. In the case of lotteries run by other States, in which the agents pay a compounding fee (sales tax) in advance, the Government would return the fee if they showed proof of their having refunded the ticket money to the public, a source said. But the lottery dealers wonder how they will refund the ticket money when their shops are shut down. ``Do we stand on the streets to refund the amount. It will lead to confusion unless the Government comes out with a clear refund plan,'' says a leading agent. ``The sudden ban will leave lakhs of educated youth engaged in lottery sales jobless.'' However, senior officials say most States including neighbouring Andhra Pradesh banned lotteries and even the Prime Minister suggested a nationwide clampdown on raffles in the public interest. However, one of the immediate reasons for the ban, the officials say, was the refusal of the lotteries run by Sikkim, Arunachal Pradesh, Mizoram and Karnataka and Bhutan to comply with Rule 20 framed under the Lotteries Regulation Act of 1998. A few months ago, the Tamil Nadu Government, invoking Rule 20, directed all other State-run lotteries to furnish details of the draw. However, most of them challenged the ``regulatory measure'', prompting the Government to rethink the need for permitting sale of lotteries. For, the scheme launched in 1968 by the then DMK Chief Minister, C. Annadurai, with the catchy slogan, ``if you win, it is for your home, and if you don't, it is for your State,'' became a gain to other States rather than Tamil Nadu. Besides, fake tickets abound. The earnings were only Rs. 22 crores from Tamil Nadu-run draws and another Rs.34 crores through the compounding fee collected from lotteries run by other States. Further, one of the leading bulk agents failed to pay a deposit amount after having been awarded the annual contract for running all Tamil Nadu-run draws, causing legal trouble.
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