New paper urges Keralam to expand own revenue base, treat lottery receipts ‘prudently’

Keralam should improve its own-revenue streams by tapping land and property transactions, user charges and finetuning its Goods and Services Tax (GST) administration and the finances of public enterprises, a new paper published by the Gulati Institute of Finance and Taxation (GIFT) has suggested.

The paper, ‘State of Kerala State Revenue: Rich State, Thin Treasury’ urges the State to treat the State lottery “prudently.” Lottery receipts, it said, should be “regarded as a volatile stream to be diversified away from, not as a stable component of own revenue on which expenditure commitments can rest.” Written by Kiran Kumar Kakarlapudi, L. Anithakumary, Sumalatha B.S. and Shency Mathew, the paper has appeared in Economy and Fiscal Watch, the new GIFT quarterly. The authors looked at the State’s revenue performance over a four-year period from 2022-23 to 2025-26.

‘Principal instrument’