Karnataka IT and Biotechnology Minister Priyank Kharge has called for a coordinated legislative effort between the Centre and states to tackle regulatory challenges in the fast-growing online gaming industry. Speaking in the Legislative Assembly, Kharge said the absence of a unified legal framework was pushing Indian gamers towards foreign platforms, creating enforcement hurdles and revenue losses. This aligns with Maharashtra Deputy Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis’s remarks last month, when he urged the Centre to enact a uniform national law to regulate online gaming.
Kharge noted that even fantasy sports, along with Sudoku and chess, have been categorised by courts as games of skill. However, he stressed that such games should not involve betting. He pointed out that India is home to nearly 590 million gamers, of which 140 million are paying users, making it one of the largest gaming markets in the world.
He told the assembly that the GST Council’s decision to impose a 28% tax on online gaming has driven many users away from Indian servers to platforms hosted in Eastern Europe, South America, and China. “Earlier, at least if we had control over the servers, we knew who was running them and where they were playing. The police could take action if required,” Kharge said.
The minister warned that overseas platforms often advertise “No GST” and “No KYC” offers to attract Indian players, sometimes luring them with promises like instant credit of large sums into their gaming wallets. “Our people are going and playing on foreign servers. Even if they are cheated, no one can do anything because we don’t know who they are or where they are,” he added.
Kharge argued that unless the central and state governments come together to introduce a robust law, it will remain “always difficult” to regulate the sector and curb such practices. His remarks came amid ongoing debates in the Assembly over the social and economic impact of online gaming and the need for clear legal definitions of skill-based and chance-based games.
