THIRUVANANTHAPURAM : There would be changes to present price structure of State lotteries, Finance Minister Thomas Isaac said Saturday. The move follows GST council’s decision to shift lotteries to the highest slab and impose a single rate of 28 percent on all state-run and authorised lottery.
The govt has decided to upgrade costs of all lotteries in the State, the minister said. It is proposed to hike the lottery price by a small margin, so the income to lottery sellers’ remains unaffected while number of prizes would stand raised at the same time, he added.
The new prices will take effect as soon as the Centre issues notification on the revised GST rate. Incidentally, the revised GST rate of 28 percent on lotteries will slash state government’s share of profits from present 14.8 percent to a mere 6.6.
The GST rate applicable to State lotteries stood at 12 percent earlier and at 28 percent for other authorised brands. The Council’s decision for uniform rate of 28% after ignoring all requests from the Kerala govt to stay the GST rate unchanged.
Given the decision, govt was forced to effect revisions for which, it called a meeting of all Unions representing lottery sellers and arrived at the cost-hike proposed now, Isaac said.
The government adopted 3 approaches to the issue, the minister explained. First, to ensure there was no decline in income earned by lottery sellers and agents. Second, to increase the number of prizes and their amounts for winners. Third, to forgo more than half of government’s share in net profits.
New Prices
Tickets priced Rs 30 will cost Rs 40 , GST included. Karunya Tickets priced Rs 50 will come down to Rs 40. With this, all weekly lotteries will come with uniform tag of Rs 40.
Since 2001, those buying up to 2000 lotteries were allowed a discount of 24 percent, while those buying up to 10,000 and above 10,000 were eligible for 24.5 and 25.25 percentage in discount. The new discounts will fall in discount series of 23.5, 24.25 and 25 percent respectively.
With escalation in lottery prices, the income of sellers is bound to increase. With cost of tickets upgrading to Rs 40 from an earlier Rs 30, the seller commission pertaining to first slab will increase from Rs 6.76 per ticket to Rs 7.27 in that place; while in the second slab, the commission rises from Rs 6.59 to Rs 7.57 per ticket and it converts from Rs 6.76 to Rs 7.81 in the third slab.
Also, there would be rise in number of prizes and prize amounts in each category of tickets.
1) Pournami : No. of prizes will increase to 30,240. The prize money at face value will increase from 51.94 percent to 57.7 percent.
2) WinWin: No. of prizes will increase to 30,240 . The prize money at face value will increase from 51.84 percent to 58.11 percent.
3) StreeShakti : No. of prizes will increase to 38.880 . The prize money at face value will increase from 51.94 percent to 97.9 percent.
4) Akshay : No. of prizes will increase to 34,560 . The prize money at face value will increase from 52.01 percent to 58.28 percent.
5) KarunyaPlus : No. of prizes will increase to 48,600 . The prize money at face value will increase from 51.99 percent to 58.08 percent.
6) Nirmal : No. of prizes will increase to 35,640 . The prize money at face value will increase from 51.86 percent to 58.11 percent.
7) Karunya : No. of prizes will increase to 7,024 . The prize money at face value will increase from 51.94 percent to 57.94 percent.
