Inside the labyrinth of national lotteries: Crores, winners and delays

Infograph: TBS

On a weekday in 2015, Abdul Kuddus – a government employee and a resident of Natore – reached home from work in the evening to find his son Sadat Ali Rifat ecstatic. Sadat had called Abdul earlier in the day to share the good news – he had won the national lottery prize worth Tk10 lakh. It was in Natore's Gopalpur Bazaar where the school-goer saw the winning ticket's number printed in a newspaper. 

The father-son duo scanned the lottery ticket and cross-checked its number with the newspaper clipping several times, and online too. 

"My son used our phone to check it. I felt nervous: Was this accurate? We checked and checked," recalled Abdul, who remembers tucking it away in the almirah at night for safekeeping. 

The following day, Abdul and his nephew took the Bangladesh Cancer Society lottery ticket and came to Dhaka to claim their prize. 

Bangladesh Cancer Society is among the many organisations that have been raising funds through lotteries in the past three decades. While the beginnings of the state-sanctioned national lottery can be traced back to the early 1990s, it went into full throttle later in the decade and in the early 2000s. 

However, lottery agents and stakeholders say that the state of affairs drastically dimmed in the last 10-15 years. And that the Covid-19 pandemic was the final blow, bringing it to a screeching halt.  

An exhaustive labyrinth 

When Abdul arrived at the Bangladesh Cancer Society office in Dhaka, he was first told that he came too late to claim his winnings. But that wasn't actually the case. After Abdul countered the officials, he was then told he requires a signature from the Natore DC office.

This was just the start of an uphill battle, but Abdul did not give up.

At the Natore DC office, Abdul was met with various queries and comments, such as "This is not real, why should the office sign it?", from the officials. From there Abdul headed to the Natore UNO office, where he found the first sliver of hope – the officer-in-charge gave him numbers to contact and attestation too.

Abdul circled back to the Natore DC office with the attestation, where they cross-checked with the UNO office and finally gave him the "signature" that the Bangladesh Cancer Society had asked of Abdul. 

However, even then, it was not enough. In an attempt to push back, Abdul used his own contacts and reached out to a member of parliament who, Abdul said, called the Society office. 

But it took more for the Society office to follow through. 

"At the time, the driver to a very senior police official in Dhaka was my relative," recalled Abdul. "It was through him, I reached out to the official, who contacted the police box in front of the Bangladesh Cancer Society. Only then, when the police got involved, the Society office agreed to pay me the lottery prize." 

"All this was to deter me, to make me miss the 'submission' date," added Abdul. Lottery tickets come with a time limit – usually, winners have 90 days to claim their prize from the respective office after the winners are announced. 

Even after all was done and dusted – and the Society office agreed to pay Abdul, it took about 15-20 days for the money to come through. 

"I was also approached by 'lottery agents' to pay them Tk5 lakh. I refused, I told them I can only manage Tk1-2 lakh at most," recalled Abdul. In the end, Abdul did receive his lottery winnings without paying a bribe. 

The whole ordeal took Abdul three to four months. And every step of the way, there were more sub-manoeuvres that the lottery winner had to partake in.  

Finally, Abdul received Tk8 lakh, "I was told Tk2 lakh was deducted as tax." 

When the Bangladesh Cancer Society was asked about Abdul's case, Hena Khanum, accounts and administration manager at the Society, said, "We certainly did not cause hassle or harassment. We asked for a certificate [the attestation] from the respective area the lottery winner belongs to. We need to ensure that the recipient is the correct winner." 

A badly-managed and broken system

A closer inspection of the inner workings of the national lottery system, along with why and how this once thriving state-sanctioned fundraising process is now languishing, revealed a badly-managed and broken system. 

Ticket sales have gradually dropped in the last decade, and most organisations no longer see national lotteries as an effective way raise to funds. This has been a result of people's lack of confidence in lotteries because of a lack of transparency surrounding the process, as Abdul Kuddus found out to his dismay. 

The last time a national lottery was conducted was back in 2019 by the Professor (Dr) Obayedullah-Ferdousi Foundation Cancer Hospital and Research Institute.

When Mollah Obaydullah Baki, the managing director and CEO at the institute was asked how much money his organisation had raised through the lottery, he said that he could not remember, and suggested that we contact the lottery agent.

"Our responsibility is to sell the tickets. We don't know how much was raised by the organisation," said Haji Alam Kabir, proprietor of Nibir Corporation and a veteran lottery agent. 

Lottery agents, through companies or consortiums, manage, distribute and sell tickets at a commission on the organisation's behalf.

Kabir further added that for the 2019 lottery, the draw was held at the Dhaka Reporters Unity (DRU) and the first-prize winner never showed up.

So who keeps the records? The organisations that conduct national lotteries or the lottery agents? 

Neither party seems to know. And that soon became the running theme: queries into the past national lotteries – even such as who were the winners – meant these two parties would just point to the other for the answer. 

Another stark finding had been the absence of publication of the winner's names. After the draw and publishing of the winning ticket numbers, winners had to go to the respective organisation and claim their prize. 

It is imperative, said Kabir, that winners' names be made public because that instils transparency and also trust in the national lottery. 

According to Kabir, one primary reason holding back public advertisements of the winner's names is that the fundraising organisation is unwilling to invest more money. He also mentioned that in some cases, it is the lottery winners who request anonymity, fearing, otherwise, people such as relatives are likely to ask them for money.

Abu Hena Md Rahmatul Muneem, senior secretary of the Internal Resources Division (IRD) of the Ministry of Finance (organisations need to seek this division's approval to run a national lottery) said "approvals" to run national lotteries had been stopped for the last three years. 

When asked why, referred to his subordinate officers for the answer. Tareq Muhammad Zakaria, senior assistant secretary of IRD, said that no organisation had applied for fundraising through lotteries over the last year.

Bangladesh Cancer Society President Dr Golam Mohiuddin Faruq said that they will take a decision on whether they will raise funds through a lottery soon. 

"If at a meeting we decide to raise funds through the lottery, we will do it ourselves. We will not issue any tender to deploy agents. I have been involved in a previous lottery and I feel there is a chance that agents can abuse the ticket sale process."

He also said that as there is distrust among lottery ticket buyers, so from now on, they will publish the name and photos of those who will win the first, second, and third prizes.

Nonetheless, the fact remains that national lotteries have been pivotal over the years for organisations like the Bangladesh Cancer Society to sustain themselves financially. 

"We raised the fund to construct the base of the 70-bed cancer hospital at Technical Mor in the city with the money collected from the lottery. It played an important role at the time," said Faruq, adding that their financial state is much better than before,  which could also potentially explain the decline in interest towards operating lotteries to raise funds. 

How exactly does a national lottery work?

Here's a breakdown of the parties involved and the system in place. The three primary parties are the government, the organisation, and the lottery agent. Lottery winners, if there are to be any who claim their prize in due time, seem to be the secondary – like an afterthought – party. 

The IRD is the regulatory body which investigates and filters applicants or organisations before granting permission or approval. 

The organisation is required to fulfil criteria and categories already set out in provisions of Bangladeshi law pertaining to lottery management, according to Haji Alam Kabir. Only then the organisation becomes eligible for the government's approval. These pre-requisite requirements include a clear income tax record, owning its own centre, etc. 

"There are many steps for verification," said Kabir, "or else anyone, like a club, could go and apply for approval. [And] it may take up to 1.5 years for this approval to come through."

Organisations that were granted approval by the government to conduct a national lottery are predominantly hospitals and sports organisations, including the Bangladesh Cancer Society, National Heart Foundation, Sandhani Eye Hospital, Bangladesh Association for the Aged and Institute for Geriatric Medicine, Bangladesh Red Crescent Society, Bangladesh Scouts, Bangladesh Olympic Association, Association For the Prevention of Drug Abuse (MANAS), Unprivileged Children's Education Programme UCEP Bangladesh, Dhaka Ahsania Mission and Professor (Dr) Obayedullah-Ferdousi Foundation Cancer Hospital and Research Institute.  

Then comes the lottery agents – consortiums of agents or companies – who take the responsibility of selling lottery tickets to the general public for a commission. 

In each case, a target goal is set between the organisation and the lottery agent. 

"For instance, a sale of 20 lakh tickets would earn a 20% commission," said Kabir. There is no fixed or predetermined rate, but an agreement between the two parties decides the target of sales and the commission rate. 

Another way is for the two parties to agree upon a 50-50 (or a different ratio) to share profit from the lottery ticket sales.  

And sometimes the organisation employs or recruits multiple agents. "One time I was up against four agents who had formed a consortium. They sold the tickets at a lower rate, say Tk7, and were able to reach the target goal faster than me. Seeing them, I lowered the ticket price too, but since they reached the target goal before me, they are the ones who earned the commission from the organisation," recalled Kabir, "I lost out and incurred a huge loss." 

When asked what had been his highest profit thus far, he said, "My highest had been selling 40 lakh tickets and making Tk20-25 lakh in profit."  

Currently, there are two leading lottery agents in the market, according to Kabir – himself and Rafiqul Islam Khan, owner of Khan Enterprise. 

"There are around five or six companies [lottery agents] in the country which manage [national] lotteries," said Khan, who became a lottery agent in 1994 and has conducted 12 to 14 national lotteries thus far. 

"More than 10,000 people were involved in the business [lottery management]," he added. 

A 1991 'lottery' seed 

But what kicked off national lotteries in Bangladesh?

"[Before the national lottery], there used to be Tk2 'coupons.' These were sold in different vibrant cinema halls at the time," said Kabir, who explained how the Bangladesh Red Crescent Society and Andho Kallyan Samity, after securing permission from the district commissioner and Bangladesh Bank, began raising funds.

"Even I remember buying those coupons," he added. 

In continuation of those coupons, the Bangladesh government designed provisions for the national lottery. But no one really made use of it, according to Kabir, until 1991. 

Spearheaded by Sadeque Hossain Khoka, the State Minister of Youth and Sports at the time, the ministries of finance and youth and sports united to conduct a national lottery for the National Sports Council. It was in dire need of funds in order to rejuvenate the council, Kabir recalled. And so, the national lottery began. 

The idea was simple. Initiate and manage the national lottery as a means for fundraising for organisations – mainly welfare organisations – and use the money to make improvements that will benefit all. 

At the time, the National Sports Council was granted approval for 10 lotteries. 

"People did not quite understand how the lottery worked or knew much about it. But by the time the third or fourth national lottery was conducted [from the initial 10 approved ones], popularity rose. The fervour became real. The magnitude of it all exceeded our imagination," said Kabir, adding that it earned the National Sports Council "crores". 

And there was transparency too, according to Kabir, who got involved in the business around the mid-1990s working as a manager at Sardar Agency. After several years, Kabir, along with Jahidul Islam, a fellow lottery agent at the time working as a manager at Khan Enterprise, left their respective jobs and formed Nibir Corporation. 

"We saw how in three months, companies earned crores, but our salaries did not reflect that," said Kabir.  

However, he recalled, after the completion of the sixth national lottery, there was a break. "Due to a mismatch of funds or mismanagement; some dishonest people had penetrated the system by then," he added. 

Even after the break, the national lottery thrived and expanded. 

Dr Muhammad Abdul Mazid, who was the secretary of IRD from 2007-2009,  said that fundraising through the lottery for social welfare organisations, hospitals and sports organisations is a good initiative. 

But over time, Mazid noted, mismanagement, a lack of transparency, and allegations against officials related to the process grew. "Organisations stopped submitting audit reports properly. As a result, the IRD did not know how many tickets were sold." 

He also said that there were instances where an organisation had taken approval for selling a specific number of tickets, but they sold many more – which were not even included in the lottery. 

Some hospital authorities also said that there were anomalies they found in the way they conduct their business. And a lack of transparency manifested. 

Haji Alam Kabir, who also claims to be the person in charge of the majority of the national lotteries, strongly protests. Instead, he believes it is imperative to rejuvenate the national lottery – starting with resuming the government's approval. 

There is much to explore and gain in this realm, Kabir concluded.