Gaming Company A23 Mounts Legal Challenge to India's New Online Money Gaming Ban

The Karnataka High Court will on Aug 30, 2025, hear a petition filed by the online gaming company, Head Digital Works, that owns the platform A23, against the newly enacted Promotion and Regulation of Online Gaming Act, 2025, people in the know told NDTV Profit.

Profit also reviewed the copy of petition filed before the high court.

The petition mentions that the legislation was enacted without any process of public consultation and is inconsistent with the government’s declared policy towards the online gaming sector. The Co. has submitted that the Act also transgresses the constitutional distribution of legislative powers.

The Act imposes a complete ban on online money gaming in India, including games of chance, games of skill and hybrid formats that combine both.

The legislation applies across the country and also extends to online money gaming services that are offered within India or operated from outside the country. While it bans all forms of online money games and related advertising, it creates a framework for the promotion of e-sports and educational games.

E-sports have been recognised as a competitive sport, with the Ministry of Youth Affairs and Sports tasked with preparing guidelines, setting up training academies and launching incentive schemes.

The law also empowers the government to recognise social games that are safe and age-appropriate, and to promote platforms distributing educational or skill-based content.

The Act establishes a national-level Online Gaming Authority to register and categorise online games, decide whether a game qualifies as a money game, and address public grievances.

It also lays down offences and penalties, including imprisonment of up to three years and fines of up to one crore rupees for offering or facilitating online money games. Advertising such games may attract a jail term of up to two years and fines up to fifty lakh rupees, with stricter penalties for repeat offenders.

Offences are cognisable and non-bailable, giving authorities powers of arrest without warrant. Companies and their officers may also be held liable for violations, with some exemptions for independent and non-executive directors who can show due diligence.

The law empowers the central government to authorise officers to investigate, search, seize property and make arrests without a warrant in certain cases, following the Bharatiya Nagarik Suraksha Sanhita, 2023. It also allows the government to frame rules on e-sports, social games, recognition of online games and functioning of the regulatory authority.

The Act builds on earlier measures introduced under the Information Technology Act, 2000, the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita, 2023, the IGST Act, 2017, and the Consumer Protection Act, 2019. These include blocking unlawful websites, penalising unauthorised betting and gambling, regulating offshore gaming platforms under GST rules, prohibiting misleading advertisements, and issuing advisories to media and influencers against promoting betting platforms.

Citizens can also report cybercrimes on the National Cyber Crime Reporting Portal or through the toll-free helpline 1930.