Debt-ridden NRI arrested for selling raffle coupons offering house, cars to fund wife’s cancer treatment

Kannur: Benny Thomas (67), a debt-ridden NRI, came up with the idea of selling raffle coupons as a last resort to free himself from mounting debts and raise money for his wife Marykutty’s cancer treatment. As the first prize, Thomas offered his seven-bedroom house on a 26-cent plot in Kannur’s Kelakam panchayat. The second prize was a used Mahindra Thar, the third a blue Maruti Celerio that his wife drove, and the fourth a second-hand Royal Enfield motorcycle.

The draw was scheduled to be held at the parish hall of St Joseph Church, Adakkathode, on December 20. A day earlier, on December 19, Kelakam police arrested Thomas for violating lottery laws, and a court later remanded him to judicial custody.

The arrest drew quiet dismay across the hill panchayats of Kannur and Wayanad, where many had rallied to support the struggling family. An officer at Kelakam police station also sounded apologetic. “We acted only because we received a complaint from the lottery department,” an officer at Kelakam police station said, adding that he hoped Thomas would be granted bail soon.

Thomas moved to Saudi Arabia in 1990, working as a driver. His wife, Marykutty, was employed as a nurse. In 2013, after years of working abroad, they built their 3,300-square-foot, two-storey house by the main road at Adakkathode. Four years later, Thomas decided to start a business in Saudi Arabia. “I took a loan of ₹2.5 crore from South Indian Bank’s Peravoor branch and invested it there,” he said before his arrest, while selling the coupons.

The business ran smoothly until the COVID-19 pandemic upended everything. In 2022, his sponsor in Saudi Arabia died. “After that, I couldn’t reopen the business. My licence expired, and I lost everything,” he said.

Another blow followed. Two years ago, Marykutty was diagnosed with breast cancer and began treatment at the MVR Cancer Centre in Kozhikode. “She has also undergone knee replacement surgeries,” said Lissy Joseph, the panchayat member and president nominee.

As medical expenses rose and the couple defaulted on repayment, the bank initiated attachment proceedings against the family’s land and house. “For two years, we tried to sell the house, but we didn’t get a fair price,” Thomas said. It was then that the idea of raffle coupons struck him.

He printed coupons priced at ₹1,500 and went public with his story. A draw planned for May had to be postponed after he failed to sell enough tickets. Later, he said, the Diocese of Mananthavady stepped in to help sell the coupons.

Thankamma Melekutt, former panchayat vice-president, said the family’s distress was genuine. “He was earnest. With the money he raised, he retrieved the title deed of the house from the bank and bought a second-hand Thar and an Enfield motorcycle to be given away. He was prepared to give up everything on the day of the draw,” she said. “This was not a man trying to cheat anyone.”

A day before the scheduled draw, police raided Thomas’s house, seized unsold coupons and counterfoils, and froze his bank account. He was arrested the next day and remanded to Thalassery sub-jail.

Police booked him under Sections 297(1) and 297(2) of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita for running an unauthorised lottery and publicising the draw, and under Sections 4(c) and 7(3) of the Lotteries (Regulation) Act, 1998, which reserve the conduct of lotteries exclusively for the State government.

Police reiterated that they acted solely on the complaint. “Otherwise, we would have to book many groups that sell raffle tickets to raise funds,” the officer said. A district lottery officer said that any ticket scheme sold for money, and prizes decided by chance, amounts to a lottery and is illegal, unless conducted by the government. Enforcement, he acknowledged, remained weak, especially when such schemes are presented as donations or fundraisers, and prizes are given away as gifts by religious or community institutions. For Benny Thomas and Marykutty, the ordeal only deepened.