For the last 12 years, Chinese professional actor Lu Jingang has been making a living by playing a poor beggar in a popular scenic spot and collecting money and food from kindhearted citizens.

Seeing Lu Jingang on the job, you’d think he was nothing but a poor beggar looking to make ends meet, but that’s only because he is really good at his job. Lu is a professional actor who has been playing the role of a beggar at the Qinming Shanghe Garden scenic area in China’s Henan Province for the past 12 years. With his dirt-covered face, sad puppy eyes, and modest clothing, he has perfected the art of getting tourists to dig deep in their pockets and help a poor guy out. Only he is very good at pretending to be poor because, in reality, he is anything but that. The talented actor reportedly earns up to 70,000 yuan ($9,730) per month, plus more food than he could ever hope to eat.

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An Indian man who spends his days asking people for pocket change on the streets of Mumbai has been dubbed the ‘world’s richest beggar’ by Indian media who claims he is worth over $1 million.

While many people in India toil long hours every single day for a few hundred rupees, Bharat Jain, the so-called ‘world’s richest beggar’, reportedly makes between 2,000 and 2,500 rupees every day by asking generous people for handouts. Jain has been begging at busy Mumbai locations like Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj Terminus railway station (CSMT) or Azad Maidan for many years now and has accumulated quite a fortune. His net worth is expected to be around 7.5 crore ($1 million), and includes a 2-bedroom flat in Mumbai worth 1.2 crore, and two shops in Thane that rent for 30,000 rupees per month. His monthly income is estimated to vary between 60,000 rupees ($731) and 75,000 rupees ($914), which is apparently a lot more than most employed Indians earn.

Photo: Brijesh Nirmal/Unsplash

According to the Economic Times, Bharat Jain did not afford to pursue any formal education and resorted to begging to earn a living. His kids, on the other hand, will not be following in his footsteps. They have already completed their education in convent schools and are already employed. Jain’s family constantly advises him to stop begging as they can afford to live comfortably without it, but he continues to hit the streets almost every day.

Bharat Jain has been making news headlines in India for his less-than-meager earnings since 2015 when his reputation as a wealthy beggar started growing. His name has since been mentioned constantly by Indian media looking for the next viral news story.

Begging is reportedly going digital in Indonesia, with street beggars posting clips on TikTok asking for virtual gifts instead of actually going out on the street.

TikTok begging has reportedly become such a widespread phenomenon in Indonesia that the Government has been forced to step in to reign it in. The Asian country’s social minister has asked her staff to increase efforts of preventing begging, both online and offline, and Muslim groups have appealed to the general public in an attempt to stop “begging and asking for free goods and money,” which they claim “demean human honor” and are forbidden in Islam. However, there is little they can do against the wave of beggars enticed by TikTok’s gift-offering features, which allow them to exchange virtual gifts for real money.

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A 79-year-old who spent most of her time begging at a train station in Hangzhou, China, was recently ousted as a relatively rich pensioner who lives in a 5-storey villa and owns several retail stores and rental properties in the city.

The woman’s story made national news headlines last week, after staff at Hangzhou’s East Railway Station started broadcasting an unusual message from loudspeakers warning passers-by not to fall for the granny’s story because she is not what she appears to be. In a surprising turn of events, even the woman’s son told reporters that their family is considerably wealthier than the average family in China. They live in a lavish villa, own several properties, some of which they rent to local business, and he himself manages a family factory. The man added that he told his mother to stop begging numerous times, but she refuses to listen.

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Everyone knows that Dubai is a rich city, but not many people know it is so rich that even beggars there can earn a small fortune by asking for handouts. Begging in Dubai is so lucrative that people come into the UAE legally, on a three-month travel visa, just so they can fill their pockets on the streets. That may sound shocking, but some of these so-called “professional beggars” or “smart beggars” can earn up to Dh270,000 ($73,500) per month. That’s more than most jobs pay in a year.

Reports of professional beggars taking advantage of the generosity and gullibility of wealthy Dubai citizens have been showing up online for the past three years now, but despite the best efforts of local police to eradicate the practice, it is still considered a widespread phenomenon. If anything, news headlines of beggars in the Las Vegas of the Middle East earning insane amounts of money by begging have only encouraged others to follow their example. Some sources report that there are now Arab and Asian gangs bringing beggars into Dubai legally and then taking most of their earnings.

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