What's Kerala Addicted to?
Kerala's Lottery Economy is an interesting study of the dichotomous relationship between what's morally good vs. what's collectively good for the masses.
When you think of an addict, what comes to your mind? Someone addicted to drugs or alcohol, right?
Well, Kerala has a new addiction - an addiction that generates more revenue for the State than its expenditure on medicines.
What is it? ReadOn.
On November 1, 1967, the Government of the newly formed State, Kerala, kicked off a Lottery Business. From selling lottery tickets worth Rs. 20 lakhs in 1967, it has now grown to a whopping Rs. 9,276 crores in 2018-19. Unparalleled.
Why, you ask?
Well, who doesn’t like easy money?
“Lottery is something that makes people dream and exploits the poorest of the poor. In Kerala, everyone, including political parties, has let them down, and they submit themselves to supernatural powers such as godmen or lotteries, searching luck. They are imagining a source of redemption through lotteries.” - Paul Zacharia, a Malayali fiction author.
“Over 79 million lottery tickets are sold every week in the State which has a population of 33 million. There are close to eight million households in Kerala, which means in a year, an average household buys about 500 lottery tickets. Households now spend around Rs. 15,000 per year on lotteries.” - Livemint
Wow.
That’s not it. Festivals have their own share of different bumper lotteries where the prize money can range from Rs. 200 to multiple crores. Last year, the Onam Special Lottery alone offered Rs. 12 crores as jackpot prize money.
But, is this lottery addiction really that bad?
A lot of lives depend on the Lottery Economy in Kerala. It employs more than 2 lakh people in the State.
The State even has lottery-for-a-purpose, helping in raising funds for social causes and environment protection. For instance, welfare organisations raised more than Rs. 1,000 crores during the Kerala floods. Not all bad, eh?
This addiction, which is now an entire industry in Kerala, has never witnessed any losses (hear, hear, Public Sector Companies) and plays a very important role in non- tax revenue earned by the State.
The State also has a robust system in place with fixed percentages and payments to middlemen, agents, vendors.
Interestingly, most of the states in India have banned lotteries. Lottery is legal only in 13 states - Assam, Arunachal Pradesh, Goa, Kerala, Madhya Pradesh, Maharashtra, Manipur, Meghalaya, Mizoram, Nagaland, Punjab, Sikkim and West Bengal.
Lotteries, which more often than not drain savings of a common man, have unofficially become the backbone of Kerala’s economy.
True, people selling lottery tickets, moving around in colourful cycles, carry a dangerous habit. But, it is undeniably an important source of livelihood now.
What may seem to be immoral to some, in fact, feeds a lot of families. When the economy doesn’t allow the odds to be in his favour, what else can the common man do?
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The researcher for this piece, Divya, explained this whole scheme of things to us super passionately. There was no way in hell that one could turn down a story told with such enthusiasm! Turned out to be a really interesting one, nai?