BANGALORE: The Karnataka High Court on Tuesday upheld the ban on lotteries and also the notification declaring Karnataka a "lottery-free zone."

Dismissing petitions by Arunachal Pradesh, Sikkim, All-India Federation of Gaming and Allied Industries and others, the court said the ban was a result of a policy decision and that it was included in the State Budget and passed by the legislature.

With this, the interim order staying the operation of the notification becomes infructuous.

Special sitting

Saying that the writ petitions were not maintainable, Justice V. Jagannathan in a three-and-half-hour dictation in open court at a special sitting, upheld the validity of the State's March 27, 2007 notification issued under Section 5 of the Lottery (Regulation) Act banning all kinds of lotteries and declaring Karnataka as a lottery-free zone.

Citing several Supreme Court judgments, including the case of B.R. Enterprises versus the State of Uttar Pradesh, he said many of the contentions relating to the validity of Section 5 of the Act had already been gone into in the case and that the Supreme Court had upheld its validity.

Infrastructure

The petitioners had challenged the notification and Arunachal Pradesh had said that it was small State and its main source of revenue was through organising lotteries. It said a large infrastructure in Bangalore had been set up for distributing lotteries and that it would suffer irreparable harm if an interim order staying the notification was not continued.

They also claimed that lakhs of people, including the physically challenged, were dependent on lottery business and the ban would affect their livelihood. They said the notification was illegal and that it violated Articles 14, 301 and 304 of the Constitution. Mr. Justice Jagannathan said policy decisions, more so those which were part of the Budget, could not be subjected to judicial review. He said the notification did not violate Article 14 of the Constitution or contravene any of its provision. The judge also dismissed a plea by the petitioners to stay the operation of the order for four weeks to enable them to move the Supreme Court.

Deputy Chief Minister B.S. Yediyurappa and Minister for Lotteries Ramachandra Gowda expressed their happiness over the order of the High Court.

The order had vindicated the stand of the Government, they said.

Caveat

Mr. Yediyurappa said the Government had directed the Advocate-General to file a caveat in the Supreme Court since there was a likelihood of the lottery operators filing a petition in that court.

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