Thiruvananthapuram: The Thiruvonam Bumper Lottery of the Kerala State Lotteries Department has notched up record sales of tickets so far.
A total of 20.5 lakh tickets have been sold till Tuesday (August 15) since the sale began on July 27. In contrast, the number of tickets sold during the same period last year was 12.83 lakh.
The Rs 25 crore first prize offered is the highest prize in any lottery in the country. The tickets are priced at Rs 500 apiece.
The first-prize winner will receive around Rs 17.5 crore after a 30 per cent income-tax outgo.
Palakkad district leads in the sale of tickets, followed by Thiruvananthapuram, Thrissur, Ernakulam, and Kottayam districts.
Around 30 lakh tickets have been printed till now while there is permission to print a maximum of 90 lakh tickets, Lottery Department sources said.
Record sales last year
The sale of tickets hit a record last year when the first prize was raised from Rs 15 crore to Rs 25 crore. In 2022, ticket sales were 12.5 lakh more than in the previous year. Last year, a total of 66,35,914 tickets were sold, while 67,50,000 tickets were printed.
The prize outgo
This year, Rs 125.54 crore will be given out as prizes in total. The total number of prizes has been increased to 5,34,670 this time from last year's 3,97,911. In other words, there are 1,36,759 more prizes this year.
There will be more winners of second and third prizes this year. Twenty persons are set to win the second prize of Rs 1 crore each and the Rs 50 lakh third prize will go to an equal number of persons.
The fourth prize is Rs 5 lakh each for 10 persons, while the fifth prize is Rs 2 lakh each for as many persons. In addition, there are a number of smaller prizes of Rs 5,000, Rs 2,000, Rs 1,000 and Rs 500.
From the Rs 25 crore first prize, 10 per cent will be given as the commission to the agent who sells the first prize winning ticket.
The total agency commission to be paid out is Rs 12.55 crore.
