As a leading
techno legal ICT law firm of India, Perry4Law
is frequently approached for numerous techno legal issues. One of
them pertains to e-commerce
laws and regulations in India.
Recently many queries have been raised about the
applicable online
gambling laws and regulations in India. We have also
observed that e-commerce
legal compliances in India are not followed in true letter
and spirit. This may be due to lack of knowledge about applicable
e-commerce laws but ignorance of laws is no excuse.
If e-commerce players do not follow the laws of the
land, they may found themselves in uncomfortable situations. For
instance, cyber
law due diligence, Internet
intermediary liability and cyber
due diligence for Indian companies are some of the issues
that have been ignored by almost all e-commerce players of India.
Coming back to the burning issue whether online
gambling and online betting is legal in India or not? We have already
covered the legality
of online gambling and betting in India and other
e-commerce
compliance requirements in India but we would briefly
cover the same once again.
The golden rule for deciding whether online gambling
in India is legal or nor has to be judged by many factors that
depends upon the facts and circumstances of each case and upon state
to state. There are many states in India where gambling is legal and
few where even online gambling and betting is legal. However, there
are some states like Mumbai where online gambling is expressly
prohibited and made a punishable offense. So it depends upon the
state where you wish to carry the online gambling and betting
business.
Then there is the rule of skills versus chance as
laid down by the courts of India. As a general rule, where the game
involves application of skill on the part of the player and the
element of chance is minimal, the activity would be considered to be
a game and not an act of gambling. However, the applicability of this
test of skill versus chance may not be applicable to online or
Internet games, betting and gambling as various judicial decisions
pertaining to different sets of facts and circumstances and can be
distinguished easily in subsequent litigations.
Finally, economic and taxation legislations like tax
laws of India, anti money laundering laws, etc are also involved
while operating online casinos, online gambling and betting and
online gamming platforms. The provisions of these economic
legislations are very stringent in nature and can cause great
detriment to the owner or operator of the online casino, gambling and
betting website.
To be on a safer side, it is better to comply with
various techno legal laws of India while opening an online gambling,
gaming and betting platform rather than facing the punitive
provisions of Indian laws.
