No actual cash play as Lok Sabha passes invoice to manage on-line gaming, betting apps

The Lok Sabha on Wednesday handed the Promotion and Regulation of Online Gaming Bill, 2025, geared toward establishing a authorized framework for the fast-growing trade and introducing safeguards for gamers.

The laws, launched earlier within the day by Union Electronics and IT Minister Ashwini Vaishnaw amid Opposition protests, was cleared a day after the Cabinet authorised it.

The Bill imposes a blanket ban on on-line video games involving financial stakes, citing habit, monetary losses and associated suicides amongst youth as key considerations.

It prohibits all types of on-line betting and playing, together with fantasy sports activities, card video games reminiscent of poker and rummy, and on-line lotteries. It additionally bans commercials selling such video games and bars banks and monetary establishments from processing or facilitating associated transactions.

Under the regulation, an “online money game” is outlined as one performed by a consumer after depositing cash with the expectation of financial acquire.

The authorities has clarified that esports and social video games will stay permissible, with subscription-based entry allowed however with out the promise of monetary returns. Offering or facilitating such video games might be punishable with imprisonment of as much as three years and/or a superb of as much as ₹1 crore, as soon as the Bill clears each Houses of Parliament.Officials stated the regulation distinguishes between permissible and prohibited gaming segments. MeitY Secretary S Krishnan defined that whereas real-money gaming apps can be curbed “in the larger public interest,” esports and social video games would stay allowed, with subscriptions permitted however with out financial returns. He described the measure as a “societal decision” and famous that considerations about job losses had been weighed in opposition to the dangers posed by cash gaming.

Industry voices and consultants additionally welcomed the transfer as a protecting step. “The new Online Gaming Bill is more than regulation, it is protection. Online money games have left children and youth vulnerable to exploitation and serious mental health risks,” Apollo Hospitals vice chairperson Preetha Reddy wrote on X.