Lok Sabha passes Bill to promote E-Sports, Ban online money Gaming

August 20, 2025

New Delhi: Lok Sabha on Wednesday passed The Promotion and Regulation of Online Gaming Bill, aiming to promote e-sports and online social games, while outlawing online money gaming.

The Bill was introduced in the Lok Sabha earlier today.

The Bill was brought in to encourage e-sports and online social games while prohibiting harmful online money gaming services, advertisements, and financial transactions related to them. The Bill seeks to completely ban on offering, operating, or facilitating online money games, irrespective of whether based on skill, chance, or both.

“When it comes to society, middle-class people, or a segment of industry. When it comes to society and the government revenue, our prime minister has always chosen the society. Never have we compromised on the interest of the society,” Union Minister for Electronics and Information Technology Ashwini Vaishnaw said, requesting the House, particularly the Opposition members, to unanimously pass the Bill in the Lok Sabha. Opposition members continued raising their slogans, as the Bill was passed by voice vote.

“Online gaming has three segments. First is e-sports which needs strategic thinking, team building, enhances cultural exchange…Second segment is online social games, be it Solitaire, Chess, Sudoku. They are educative and entertaining. They are widely played,” Vaishnaw further said.

“There is a third segment, online money game, which is a cause of concern in the society. There are people, there are families who got addicted to online money games. They lose their hard-earned money. Algorithms are sometimes such that it is different to know with whom you are playing. Algorithms are opaque.”

“Many families have been devastated, many died by suicide,” the minister said. Online money game is seriously affecting families, terror being financed, money being laundered.

There will be no punishment for those playing online money games; it is only the service providers, advertisers, promoters, and those who financially support such games will face the consequences, said sources.

“No punishment for those playing online games. No punishment to victims. Only punishment for service providers, advertisers, promoters and who support financially to such games,” a source said on Wednesday.

Through this legislation, the government aims to promote e-sports and give them legal recognition.

This bill will help in providing legal support to e-sports. Earlier, there was no legal backing for e-sports, sources said.

“We have interacted with the 3rd segment of the online gaming industry. We tried to impose GST also, but the challenge continued. We had no option but to choose society for the welfare of people,” a source said.