Thiruvananthapuram: The sales of this year's Onam bumper lottery, which offers a whopping Rs 25 crore as the first prize, touched record levels.

A total of 54.50 lakh tickets were sold until Tuesday, as against 54 lakh tickets traded last year.

Now just around five lakh printed tickets remain. The authorities hope the remaining lot will be sold off in the next few days and total sales will touch the 60-lakh mark.

A decision on whether to print more tickets will be decided by Wednesday evening.

The lottery draw will be held on September 18. The ticket price is Rs 500. This was Rs 300 last year when the prize money was Rs 12 crore.

Rs 272.50 crore so far flowed into the State exchequer when 54.50 lakh lottery tickets were sold.

However, the Government won't receive the full amount. There will be some deductions on account of agency commission, printing cost, administration cost, prize money, and the like.

The first prize winner can take home Rs 15.75 crore after deducting the agency commission of 10 % and taxes of 30 %.

The second prize will carry prize money of Rs five crore. Ten tickets will be given the third prize, each getting Rs one crore.

Due to security issues, the Onam bumper was printed in fluorescent ink. It is for the first-time fluorescent ink is used to print lottery tickets in Kerala.

The tickets were printed at the Kerala State Centre for Advanced Printing and Training (C-apt). The Department of State Lotteries rolls out six bumper tickets in a year.