PROGA and how to "protect" consumers
The Promotion and Regulation of Online Gaming Act (PROGA), 2025 prohibits online money games involving monetary stakes which have raised issues of well-being. It also seeks to legitimise e-sports and non-monetary digital gaming as industries contributing to India’s digital economy. According to WHO, around 5.5% of women and 11.9% of men globally experience some level of harm from gambling.
According to Lumikai’s 2024 report, India’s online gaming market was valued at $3.8 billion in FY24 and was projected to more than double to $9.2 billion by 2029. Real-money gaming comprised approximately 86% of this market, making it the dominant revenue driver for an industry that employed over 130,000 professionals across over 1,800 companies. Government estimates suggest annual GST and income tax collections from the RMG sector exceeded ₹20,000 crore. The ban eliminates this revenue stream entirely while simultaneously increasing enforcement costs for website blocking, payment gateway monitoring, and prosecution of violations. Rather than protecting users, prohibition has achieved precisely the opposite outcome. The 155 million Indians who participated in RMG are forced to migrate to unregulated offshore platforms accessible via VPNs, mirroring the gambling landscape in prohibitionist jurisdictions like the UAE and China.
The expansive definition of a money game in the act risks inadvertently capturing legitimate business models, discouraging innovation in the sector. Well-designed regulatory frameworks, such as the one implemented by the UK Gambling Commission, or Spelinspektionen in Sweden can mandate spending limits and loss caps, and enforce age-verification mechanisms to prevent minors from accessing real-money games. In addition, standardised disclosures around odds, risks, grievance redressal mechanisms, and data-sharing obligations can improve transparency and help regulators assess systemic risks in real time. Online real-money gaming unquestionably poses risks. The question is whether those risks are better managed through prohibition or regulation. By choosing prohibition over regulation, India has foregone not merely tax revenue but the entire ecosystem of benefits that a well-regulated gaming industry provides.