In June, 11 women sanitation workers from the southern Indian state of Kerala pooled money to buy a lottery ticket. Last week, they were overjoyed to find out they had hit the jackpot of 100m rupees ($1.2m; £946,685).
The women are part of a group that collects non-biodegradable waste from households in Parappanangadi town in Kerala’s Malappuram district. They usually get around 250 rupees a day – from monthly payments made by the households – and occasionally a share of the money made by the local corporation from selling the segregated waste they collect.
The money, they say candidly, is not enough to make ends meet. Most of the women have borrowed money and taken loans for their children’s education and other expenses.
That’s why they would occasionally join forces to buy a lottery ticket.
The lottery is largely illegal in many Indian states but Kerala’s government itself runs a highly popular programme – private lotteries are banned in the state.
“Once, we won a 1,000-rupee prize and shared it,” says MP Radha, who usually buys tickets for the group.
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Last month, the group decided to buy a 250-rupee ticket for a monsoon bumper prize lottery (bumper prize lotteries are issued for special occasions such as festivals).
Kuttimalu, 72, says she was initially sad when Radha was collecting funds because she didn’t have enough money.
“Then Cherumannil Baby (another member of the group) told me she had 25 rupees and was willing to lend me half of it for the ticket,” she tells the BBC.
So the two women put in 12.5 rupees each for their share of the ticket while the other nine women paid 25 rupees each.
“We agreed we would get an equal share if we won anything,” Ms Kuttimalu says. “We didn’t expect to win such a huge amount of money!”
The women only found out they had won a day after the draw, when one of them asked her husband to check the results.