The government has blocked 692 online betting/gambling sites between 2022 and 2024, the Minister of State for Electronics and Information Technology Jitin Prasada said in response to a Lok Sabha query by MP Shreyas M Patel on December 4.

The Minister stated that the Government also issued similar directions to print, electronic, and digital media, influencers, social media, and online intermediaries to avoid publishing misleading online gambling advertisements. Earlier, in 2020, the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting (MIB) issued an advisory about online gaming and fantasy sports to all private satellite television channels directing them to adhere to the guidelines stipulated by the Advertising Standards Council of India.

Questions left unanswered

In addition to asking the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MeitY) about the government’s awareness and measures to combat illegal online gambling or gaming, Patel also inquired about the following questions:

• Whether the government considers the prevalent gambling apps as a game of chance or a game of choice and the rationale behind this classification?
• Whether the Government plans to introduce legislation to regulate or prohibit online gambling to prevent harm to citizens and if so, the details of such proposed legislation?

Responding in part to the second question, Prasada detailed the inclusion of legislation to combat online gaming within “Petty organised crime” as defined by the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita, 2023 (BNS), with a minimum imprisonment of one year and a fine. Additionally, the Information Technology (Intermediary Guidelines and Digital Media Ethics Code) Rules, 2021 (IT Rules) were also notified under the ambit of online harms.

In 2023, MeitY issued new rules mandating self-regulation of the gaming industry through bodies approved by the ministry. However, following dissatisfaction with an application submitted for a self-regulatory body by an online gaming authority, these plans were halted.

While the government claims to tackle the harms caused by online gambling, there exist discrepancies in data tracking about the same. As per a 2023 RTI filed by MediaNama, MeitY does not separately track online gambling-related suicides outside of the data recorded by the National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB) and has no plans to do so. Later, another RTI reply disclosed that the NCRB doesn’t separately collect such aggregate data on gambling-related suicides either. This response corresponded with the answers to previous parliamentary questions asked in 2021, 2023, and now in 2024.

However, as previous reports indicated, such data creates discrepancies and inaccuracies, evident in the case of Tamil Nadu, where the government announced 17 online gambling-related suicides, while NCRB figures suggested that no cybercrime-related suicides occurred between 2019 and 2021.

Efforts against online gambling

To curb the disastrous impact of online gambling, Tamil Nadu attempted twice to initiate legislation to ban such games; however, the Madras High Court bulldozed the state government’s efforts. The Karnataka High Court also struck down a similar ban in the state, with both courts deeming that the states had overstepped their powers by extending the ban to non-gambling games like rummy. Later in 2024, protests erupted in Karnataka demanding a ban on online rummy games alleging disastrous consequences like loan accumulation and addiction for marginalised youth. Besides this, in a further effort to deter minors from online gaming, the Tamil Nadu Gaming Authority later recommended the implementation of ‘Know Your Customer’ (KYC) verification.

Besides these efforts, BJP minister Vijay Goel launched a campaign against online gaming in November 2024. He also mentioned reports of suicides stemming from gaming addiction and chided celebrities for endorsing such applications. However, online betting brand Piraslot later hacked Goel’s website within a few days of the campaign’s launch.

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