The Hindu : HC directive against seizing sold lottery tickets

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Friday, Jan 10, 2003

Southern States

Southern States - Tamil Nadu

HC directive against seizing sold lottery tickets

By A. Subramani

CHENNAI JAN. 9. "There shall be no sale of lottery tickets in the territory of Tamil Nadu from January 9 onwards, until further orders," the First Bench of the Madras High Court ruled today.

Declining to stay yesterday's GO prohibiting the sale of lotteries run by any State, including Tamil Nadu, the Bench comprising the Chief Justice B. Subhashan Reddy and Justice Malai. Subramanian, however, said the tickets sold up to January 8 should not be seized.

On the status of the tickets already sold, the Bench said, "We make it clear that in the event of an interim order being granted on a future hearing date, the draws which are scheduled from today, shall be rescheduled".

It directed the State Government to publicise the issue "so that all people who are interested in the purchase of tickets can know their rights and legal consequences".

Earlier, when a batch of petitions from bulk lottery agents came up, the Advocate-General, N.R. Chandran, took notice on behalf of the Government and said he would file a counter-affidavit on January 14 detailing the reimbursement scheme. Submitting that on an average about 365 draws were being held daily by operators, he said it assumed the proportion of a virus. Despite a severe financial crunch, the State Government decided to ban lotteries keeping the public interest in mind.

On a petitioner's contention that the State was attempting to appropriate the sale proceeds without a reciprocal obligation to conduct the draw and give away the prize money, Mr. Chandran said dates mentioned in the sold tickets were only "expectations and not a promissory note".

Stating that a lottery scheme was akin to liquor policy, the Advocate-General said if a State was unwilling to conduct the scheme it could not be compelled to do so. Also, the ban would not inflict any irreparable loss on agents and purchasers and any loss could be monetarily compensated.

Counsel for one of the petitioners, Nalini Chidambaram, submitted that as agents of Tamil Nadu lottery bought tickets from the Government on `all-sold basis', there was no scope for refunding unsold tickets.

Senior advocate, R. Gandhi, insisted on an interim relief to the affected agents and their customers, and apprehended that a law and order problem would arise if their interests were not taken care of.

"We cannot question the government policy,'' the Bench observed, adding, "we granted interim orders in Mizoram and other cases only on the ground that the Supreme Court had held that there could not be a ban if the State Government had its own lottery scheme. Now the Tamil Nadu Government has banned its own lottery".

"We are of the view that the balance of convenience does not warrant any interim order at this stage," the judges said before posting the matter to January 14 for further hearing.

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