1 IN THE HIGH COURT OF JUDICATURE AT BOMBAY APPELLATE SIDE, BENCH AT AURANGABAD CRIMINAL APPLICATION NO. 1511 OF 1997 Gopalkrishna s/o. Rajaram Bangad, Age 30 yrs., Occu. Business, Licence holder of "Shanti Medical Agencies", R/o. Jalna. ....Applicant. Versus 1. The State of Maharashtra (Through Police Inspector, Baliram s/o. Munnalal Rathod, of Police Stn. Sadar Bazar, Jalna.) 2. The Superintendent of Police, Jalna District, Jalna. ....Respondents. Mr. Rajendra S. Deshmukh, Advocate for applicant. Mr. S.N. Kendre, A.P.P. for respondent Nos. 1 and 2. CORAM: A. V. NIRGUDE, J. DATED: 1st September, 2010. ORAL JUDGMENT : 1. This application seeks quashing of the Crime No.102/1997 registered at Sadar Bazar Police Station, Jalna under section 4 of the Bombay Lotteries (Control and Tax) and Prize Competitions (Tax) Act, 1958, against the applicant. 2. Facts leading to the litigation are as under :- 2 The applicant is running wholesale business of medicine. He floated scheme for promotion of the business for his customers that every customer, who would buy goods worth Rs. 9,525/-, would be given a coupon, having a number. After certain period the numbers would be put in lottery and the customers having lucky numbers would be given certain prizes in valuable goods like car, motorcycle, etc. Admittedly, for running such scheme the applicant did not obtain license as required under section 6 of the above mentioned Act. 3. The applicant asserted that the scheme did not amount to a lottery and so he did not need license to run such a scheme. However, this assertion has no basis in law. 4. The term "lottery" is defined under section 2 (a) of the said Act. It reads as under :- "(a) "lottery" does not include a prize competition" The term "prize competition" is also defined under section 2 (d) and it says, "prize competition" means a prize competition within the meaning of the Prize Competitions Act, 1955". The term "prize competition" is defined under section 2 (d) of the Prize Competition Act, 1955, as under :- "(d) "prize competition" means any competition (whether called a crossword prize competition, a missing-word prize competition, a picture prize 3 competition or by any other name) in which prizes are offered for the solution of any puzzle based upon the building up, arrangement, combination of premutation, of letters, words or figures." Obviously, the scheme that the applicant proposed and the coupons he printed and possessed, did not amount to a 'prize competition'. 5. The learned advocate appearing for the applicant contended that since coupons are distributed free of cost to the customers, there is no sale of lottery tickets or chances. He, while making the submission, obviously ignored the other provisions of the Act. Section 2 (h) defines the term "ticket", which in this case is equivalent to coupon, as under :- "(h) "Ticket" includes, in relation to any lottery or proposed lottery, any document evidencing the claim of a person to participate in the chances of the lottery." Coupon, thus, is a document evidencing the possessor's claim to participate in the lottery that would be held between the coupon holders. There is no dispute about the fact that all coupon holders would not get prizes, but only the lucky ones would get and the lucky numbers would be drawn in the lottery. In view of this, the ingredients of section 4, prohibiting running of unlawful lottery are, thus, satisfied in the complaint lodged against the applicant. The application, therefore, fails and the same stands dismissed. 4 In view of dismissal of the main application, the application for intervention and fixing early date of hearing, if any, stand disposed of. [ A. V. NIRGUDE, J.] ssc/ca1511.97