In response to a Lok Sabha query filed by MP Shreyas M Patel, the Minister of State for Electronics and Information Technology, Jitin Prasada, stated that the government of India has blocked 692 betting and gambling sites between 2022 and 2024 under the IT Act.
The minister’s response also added that the government had issued orders to print, electronic, and digital media, influencers, social media platforms, and other online intermediaries to avoid publishing misleading ads related to betting and gambling websites.
The Indian government hasn’t been kind to online betting services for a while now. This also includes an advisory issued by the Ministry of Information and Broadcast (MIB) about online gaming and fantasy sports to private satellite TV channels, reminding them to stick to guidelines released by the Advertising Standards Council of India.
Regardless, the query doesn’t answer all of the MP’s questions. Questions were raised about the government’s awareness of the issue and the action being taken to combat illegal betting or gambling on the web. Questions were also raised about whether the government considers currently available gambling apps games of chance or games of choice.
However, Prasada didn’t quite provide a detailed response. He did point out the new rules added into legislation that label such online activity as “petty organised crime” as defined by the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita, 2023 (BNS), which carries a minimum imprisonment of one year and a fine.
The government has made claims about restoring the damage done by online gambling websites, but the data backing these claims has discrepancies. MediaNama claims that as per a 2023 RTI filed by the publication, MeiTY didn’t track online gambling-related suicides separately other than the data recorded by the National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB) and didn’t have any plans to do so either.
Additionally, another RTI revealed that the NCRB doesn’t separately collect such data on gambling-related suicide either. Such data adds discrepancies in the NCRB figures used to track the government’s progress on the issue.
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