The finance minister, Namgay Dorji, while officially launching the Royal Bhutan Lottery Office at Phuentshogling, this morning, said the initiative was to meet the trade deficit with India.
Bhutan Lottery was closed in September 2011 following major controversies. The former government banned the sale of lotteries and closed the office saying it was against the Gross National Happiness values.
“Today, what I want to highlight is that, Bhutan is too much dependent on imports. We import more and export very little. Then we are facing trade deficit. For example, the majority of our imports are from our neighbor India,” said Lyonpo Namgay Dorji.
He also said the business will be operated within the country initially. “Later, we might open outside. When we start lottery outside, we would expect income generations.”
Restarting lottery business was one of the government’s election pledges.
Peoples’ Democratic Party’s first 100 days pledges say they will start negotiating with the relevant state governments of India to restart Bhutan Lottery Business.
Bhutan Lottery Office’s Chairman, Lham Dorji said now the board and Chief Executive Officer have to meet to formulate various activities. “… What sort of lottery schemes should we have within Bhutan? And if we go beyond the country’s border, how do we formulate such programmes?”
To avoid problems like in the past, Lham Dorji said they are going to avoid agents.
In the coming years, paper lotteries will be introduced and they will also explore semi-online lotteries.
The office will soon recruit office bearers to begin the business.
