India saw a significant rise in GST payable from the paper lottery, according to the data shared by the Ministry of Home Affairs in Parliament.
As per the ministry, while in eight months (July 2017 to March 2018), total GST payable from paper lottery was Rs 2993.15 crore, it was increased in the first eight months of Financial Year 2018-19. During this period, the central government claimed that the total payable GST is Rs 3164.53 crore.
"Paper, as well as online lotteries, are being organised by 4 States viz. Arunachal Pradesh, Mizoram, Nagaland and Sikkim and one autonomous region of Bodoland Territorial Council (BTC). Four states viz. Kerala, Maharashtra, Punjab and West Bengal are organizing only paper lotteries," Home Ministry stated.
MHA also claimed that the amount of Service Tax collected from lottery distributors and selling agents during the year 2016-17 was Rs 260 crores approximately.
According to the data, for the first eight months of the financial year 2018-19, almost 70 per cent GST of total GST payable is from West Bengal (Rs 2237.31 crores). Data also mentions that West Bengal is the biggest playground for paper lotteries.
On the other hand online lottery is flourishing in Maharashtra. Almost 55 per cent of total payable GST (Rs 560 crores) from the online lottery is from Maharashtra (Rs 304.41 crores).
The government for an online lottery conducted a study which recommended "for testing of application software, mobile apps, if any, and random number generators (RNG) used for online lotteries, provision for integrity verification in application software and disaster recovery server. Amendments to the Lotteries (Regulation) Rules, 2010 are under consideration which would also include regulatory provisions relating to online lotteries," MHA said.
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