Despite complaints from House opposition leaders, the Rajya Sabha approved the Promotion and Regulation of Online Gaming Bill on Thursday. A voice vote passed the legislation in spite of the clamour.
After declaring that the Upper House had approved the law, Deputy Chairman Harivansh adjourned the meeting for ten minutes.
Ashwini Vaishnaw, the minister of electronics and information technology, is spearheading the bill, which would outlaw all online money games while encouraging eSports and online social gaming.
The Upper House approved the law after rejecting the amendments proposed by opposition members.
The Lok Sabha had approved the measure the day before.
The Online Gaming Bill also forbids banks and other financial organisations from enabling or transferring payments for online money games, as well as from advertising them.
The proposed prohibition will apply to online money games, which are those that require players to deposit money in the hopes of earning cash or other prizes.
According to the bill, which has been approved by both chambers, offering or facilitating online money games carries a maximum sentence of three years in prison and a fine of up to ₹1 crore.
During the debate, Vaishnaw informed the MPs, “People lose their life savings in online money gaming.”
According to Ashwini Vaishnaw, “Our purpose of this bill and this exercise has been ongoing for almost three-plus years, where we have deeply engaged with industry to see how the harmful impact can be prevented, contained, and reduced.”
In an interview with ANI, Vaishnaw clarified that the bill’s goal is to “promote and encourage the good parts,” emphasising the establishment of the Indian Institute of Creative Technologies (IICT) as a centre for game creation, where gaming has been recognised as a crucial vertical.
The minister also emphasised how terrorist organisations have abused several platforms for communications purposes, money laundering, and financing terrorism. Popular gambling sites, including Dream11, Mobile Premier League (MPL), Howzat, SG11 Fantasy, WinZO, and PokerBaazi, are probably going to be impacted by the new rule.