A lottery player in Shanghai won the biggest single-ticket jackpot ever in the city, taking home eight million yuan (US$1.15 million) at the weekend, Jiefang Daily reported today.

The person, whose identity has not been released, bought a lottery ticket with a combination of 12 numbers and won the top prize in the nationwide Super Lotto that was worth eight million yuan, the report said.

This was the first time a person in Shanghai has ever won the top prize. It's also the first time the city had a single-ticket jackpot exceeding five million yuan, the report added.

The winner will have 35 days to collect the money.

Lotteries have generated huge economic and social returns in China in the past two decades.

A total of 363 billion yuan worth of lottery tickets had been sold by the end of last year, and more than a third of the money was spent on public welfare including sports facilities, education and health care for the handicapped. Lotteries have also given people the chance to get rich. Last October, an unidentified individual in Gansu Province won the country's largest individual prize of 102.7 million yuan.

But the industry has also encountered growing problems. Two lottery outlet owners in Hebei Province were charged last year after the country's largest bank theft, which involved 51 million yuan.

The owners allegedly provided former bank employees Ren Xiaofeng and Ma Xiangjing with bags to transfer bundles of cash.

Ren and Ma stole 51 million yuan from the bank and spent almost all of the money on lottery tickets at the owner's outlets. Ren and Ma were sentenced to death last year.

In 2004, several people were found guilty of manipulating a scratch-and-win sports lottery in Shaanxi Province and were sentenced to prison.

(Shanghai Daily April 7, 2008)