Gambling in India: laws, traditions and reliable offers

All of you know this geo if you follow gambling trends even a bit: almost all media buying teams and webmasters work in India. Meanwhile, this is a country with unique practices of gambling regulation, analogs of which there are no analogs in principle. To prove this assertion, we will make a small historical excursion, and at the same time, we will tell you why working with traffic in the peninsula of Hindustan is still a great and profitable venture. Today you will not only get a basic overview of this geo but also learn what games and offers you can start work with traffic right now because we have prepared a whole guide to India:

• history of gambling laws in the country;
• rules and laws of iGaming environment in modern India;
• the most popular games and offers; 
• market growth and prospects for the coming year. 

Background of gambling laws in India

If not the birthplace of gambling, India is certainly one of the first places where it appeared. Ancient religious texts such as the Ramayana record the first entertainment as early as 7300 B.C. – appreciate the scale! This is also where dice became popular as a method of randomly selecting a winner: it would later spread worldwide.

The history of the independent Indian state goes back thousands of years, and by the 15th century, local gambling traditions were at their peak. America had not yet been discovered, and in Delhi and Bombay there were already prototypes of modern casinos. Interestingly, animal fights were in great demand: it turns out that fighting between roosters is not a French invention (although it reached the peak of popularity there).

As the years went by, Europeans took notice of the continent. With the arrival of the British, India’s legal culture changed rapidly and came to an almost modern form of existence. Why is the law, adopted more than 150 years ago, still relevant, and what is the fundamental difference between poker and roulette, which still does not quietly legalize the latter? About all in order.

Gambling Act as a legacy of colonialism

During the colonial period, Indians became significantly addicted to the new trends of gambling. There were many games, including the notorious cricket, which is still the national sport. It is important that the turnover of illegal betting grew, along with all the associated crimes. Drunkenness, loan sharking, debt-rigging, and mugging are all the delights surrounding underground gambling. The British administration needed to act, and it did.

In 1867, the famous Public Gambling Act was passed – a single set of laws controlling all gambling in the state. It did not ban absolutely all activities but significantly restricted them, actually taking gambling houses out of the legal field. Here, it is particularly interesting to see what principle was used.

Game of Chance or Game of Skill

Luck or skill was the division line chosen by pragmatic British lawmakers. Games in which any participant could win completely at random were banned. It is not difficult to guess that this category included dice and roulette, as well as some primitive card games.

The category of skill games included both classic poker and rummy – its Indian localization with its own rich history. Also, dominoes and chess were not completely banned: some freedom for gambling lovers remained. I wonder if the person who signed this law of distant years could have thought that its effect would outlive the author for a long time.

Many years and events have passed: India has given the world Gandhi, curried rice, an ongoing conflict with Pakistan, and meme-famous programmers. All this time The Public Gambling Act has worked and is working, and even now it defines the key rules of gambling in the country.

Current regulations and nuances by state

To date, the regulations in the country are extremely complex and need to be clarified. To begin with, the above-mentioned law applies to all Indian states – administrative units of the state. At the same time, each of them is free to introduce additional amendments, separately regulating local rules. In addition, the Information Technology Act adopted in 2000 also works throughout the country. Still, it says nothing about gambling, and its main application is limited to the control of illegal transactions.

Online gambling is legal in states such as Goa and Sikkim, where real casinos can also be found. That said, several states in the southeast have banned online gambling – Chhattisgarh, Andhra Pradesh, Tamil Nadu, and Telangana are among them. However, most states have no further amendments in place, meaning online casinos remain in a gray area with no regulation. 

What is also interesting is that although a ban on online gambling has been adopted in some places, it is extremely difficult to hold real players accountable: it is extremely difficult to find relevant precedents. And all of this leads us to a situation where there is a law, but in fact it does not work, because it was developed more than a hundred years ago and does not take into account modern realities.

The most popular activities and games 

Despite loopholes in the legislation, the local market is growing steadily, and arbitrageurs are pleased with the high activity of players. In India, both Western games, such as roulette and poker, and local amusements, such as the aforementioned rummy are traditionally widespread. As it is in Latin America, there is a high prevalence of lotteries and bingo, which are also very popular among the population in India.

Online casinos are both a serious prospect and a very significant social problem: offshore sites are very common in India, which do not contribute to the state’s coffers in any way and are, in fact, a means of transferring money abroad to the accounts of third-party beneficiaries. These sites offer a huge selection of slots, popular absolutely everywhere in the world: the population of the country is no different from you and me, and they like to try their luck at Book of Ra or Crazy Monkey. 

In addition to the masses of new offerings, the Indian market has some timeless classics that have been tried and tested over the years. Sites like Odds or 4rabet discovered this geo back in the day and still remain relevant, with multinational giants like 1xBet and 1win adding to the mix in recent years. More competition between advertisers means more lucrative offers for arbitrageurs, which you can take advantage of right now.

Where to advertise iGaming-offers? Facebook Ads dominates the list of sources: the huge indie audience never ends. A good alternative can be context and teaser networks, where the competition is slightly lower. By the way, note that TikTok is banned in the country: you can sit in it via VPN, but you can’t upload your own videos. 

As for creatives and approaches, we will reveal a Polichinel secret here: despite rapid development, India is still an extremely poor country with a high level of inequality. What to do about it? Enter from the earnings side, of course! Creatives that offer a quick income still convert, but you need to work hard on retention to achieve a high ROI and not get a cutoff in the future.

Market growth in 2025

Almost one and a half billion people in a fast-growing economy with an active increase in internet usage are ideal audiences for making money from affiliate programs. India has been in the top geo of traffic arbitrage for years, providing an excellent opportunity for a start: here, you can inexpensively test campaigns, which are later scaled to more expensive countries for the Bay Area.

The total revenue of the country’s online gambling market is estimated at $2.9 billion in 2024 alone, with an estimated annual growth rate of 6%. By 2030, that figure could exceed $4 billion, and that’s one region that has every potential for further expansion: infrastructure is sprawling, new platforms are emerging, and the culture of online gambling is growing yearly. 

Conclusion

Undoubtedly, India will remain an attractive geo for media buying and marketing for gambling affiliates, and the local iGaming market will grow rapidly. To take advantage of this opportunity to earn good results, connect a platform for tracking incoming traffic, and even create a full-fledged affiliate program, having at hand any statistics available. Alanbase will be such a solution: Alanbase combines key functions in one window, including affiliate management, traffic management, payouts, and offers.

You can start working with Alanbase now: leave a request for a call, l and a manager will contact you. Working with the software will allow you to get traffic in India or any other region, having full real-time traffic statistics. 14 days of free access to the system and no bank card linkage: sounds like a great opportunity to earn without limits. A personal manager will help you build a program for your needs and give you full access.

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