Imam Uddin, the owner of a plastic toy store in the Mitford area of ​​Dhaka, was awarded Tk 1 lakh in exchange for eating a breakfast worth about Tk 85, including VAT, at a restaurant in the capital.

Although this story may seem unrealistic, especially considering the ongoing coronavirus crisis, it is in fact, the truth.

Imam opens his shop very early every morning even though very few customers pay a visit these days thanks to Covid-19.

Just a couple months after opening his business last year, the government had imposed a nationwide lockdown between March 23 and May 30 in a bid to curb the spread of the deadly virus.

As a result, Imam  was forced to completely shut down his store for the duration. Seeing as his family had a very hard time back then, he now comes to the shop early each morning without eating breakfast to ensure that no potential shopper finds a shuttered shop.

Imam usually grabs a light snack from a nearby restaurant to make up for the lost breakfast but June 20 ended up being different.

Like any other day, he ate at his usual restaurant and the bill came out to Tk 85 with Tk 5.93 as value-added tax (VAT). Imam  was handed a token after paying and instead of throwing it away like he always does, he absentmindedly placed it in his pocket.

While eating at the same restaurant a few days later, he noticed a banner bearing a token number. The banner also said that the owner of this token number would receive a price of Tk 1 lakh.

So, Imam took a photo of the banner and after returning home that night, he realised that the numbers exactly matched the token he had kept by accident.

"I never dreamed that I would get such a big prize, especially in these bad times. Obviously, it's a big amount of money in the present situation," Imam told The Daily Star after receiving a cheque of Tk 1 lakh from the National Board of Revenue (NBR) yesterday.

This was all thanks to an NBR initiative to boost the collection of value added tax (VAT) from the retail level and plug the scope for evading this charge.

As such, the NBR recently announced this prize along with 100 others which would be disbursed through lotteries in a bid to encourage people to ask for machine-generated receipts, ensuring that the actual amount of VAT paid goes to the state coffer .

On July 5, the NBR held the lottery with the receipts generated through electronic fiscal devices (EFDs) against purchases made at stores, said a press release issued by NBR Commissioner SM Humayun Kabir.

Although the first draw of the lottery was held on February 5 this year, no one had claimed first prize before Imam.

"It was a very good initiative of the NBR. I believe it will encourage people to pay VAT properly," he said, adding that he will invest the money in his business so that it may survive the Covid-19 fallout.

The second prize is Tk 50,000 and the third prize is Tk 25,000. The NBR issues five prizes for the third category. Besides, the prize money for the remaining 94 prizes is Tk 10,000 each.