Congress MP Shashi Tharoor Moves Private Member’s Bill Seeking To Regulate Online Gaming Sector

Congress leader and Lok Sabha member Shashi Tharoor has introduced a private member’s bill in the lower house of parliament to seek a regulatory mechanism for the largely unorganised online gaming sector, Economic Times has reported.

Tharoor was cited in the report as saying that the country needs a regulatory body, like the one he has proposed, in his Sports (Online Gaming And Prevention of Fraud bill). He said that while the online gaming industry needs to follow self-regulatory practices, a statutory framework with government oversight is urgently needed to ensure service providers are following licence conditions as well as to track suspicious betting to curb generation of black money.

“The main purpose of my bill is to preserve the integrity of sports. The bill is primarily divided into two parts for this purpose. One part recognises the offence of sports fraud and prescribes a special procedure to deal with it. The other part acknowledges the fact that the increasing commercial nature of sports increases financial incentives for vested interests to manipulate sporting events, therefore, it provides for the regulation of online sports betting activities,” Tharoor was quoted in the report as saying.

The number of gamers in India has seen a jump of more than 30 per cent in last three years, according to All India Gaming Federation (AIGF). The present market for online gaming, according to 276th report of Law Commission of India, is worth $360 million and will likely rise to $1 billion by 2021.