New Delhi: Most online games in India will no longer need prior classification by a regulator to operate — that is the single biggest practical change in the Promotion and Regulation of Online Gaming Rules, 2026, notified Wednesday evening, and coming into force from 1 May.
The shift dismantles the core assumption of the October 2025 draft rules, which treated determination of a game’s nature as the starting point of the entire regulatory process.
“To offer a game, you don’t have to be either determined or registered unless you want to offer it as an e-sport,” Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MeitY) Secretary S. Krishnan told a briefing Wednesday.
A game now only faces classification if the authority targets it on its own, if the provider wants to offer it as an e-sport, or if the central government specifically flags a category. Nothing has been flagged yet.
The rules came eight months after Parliament passed the Promotion and Regulation of Online Gaming Act in August 2025—legislation that banned real money gaming outright, caused platforms including Dream11, MPL and WinZO to suspend operations, and set up the statutory authority that will now begin functioning on May 1.
The Promotion and Regulation of Online Gaming Act, 2025 formally recognised e-Sports and online social games while imposing a blanket ban on all online money gaming.
A central Gaming Authority was established to register permitted games and enforce prohibitions. The law was driven by concerns over youth addiction, financial losses, and the misuse of gaming platforms for money laundering. Critics, however, argued it abandoned the long-held legal distinction between skill-based and chance-based games.
Constitutional challenges were filed in multiple High Courts, and the Supreme Court took up all petitions for a definitive ruling. The matter is still pending.
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Watchdog gets a new member
The October 2025 draft proposed an authority comprising a chairperson and five members: three joint secretary-level officials from the ministries of Information and Broadcasting, Youth Affairs and Sports, and Financial Services, along with two director-level members, at least one of whom would have legal expertise.
The notified rules scrap the two director slots entirely and replace the composition with five joint secretaries: Home Affairs, Financial Services, Information and Broadcasting, Youth Affairs and Sports, and Legal Affairs.
Home Affairs was not in the draft at all. Its addition signals that the government sees enforcement — against illegal offshore platforms, money laundering, and fraud — as central to the authority’s mandate, not peripheral.
Krishnan confirmed the MHA link is tied to enforcement: “There is an enforcement mechanism in the Ministry of Home Affairs.”
The quorum moves from one-third to half. Emergency decisions must reach all members within three days, not seven.
One significant downgrade: the draft gave the authority civil court powers — summoning witnesses on oath, receiving evidence on affidavit, issuing commissions. The notified rules quietly drop all of this, binding the authority only by principles of natural justice.
‘Material Change’ is gone
The draft rules created a concept called “material change” — any modification in a game’s features or revenue model that could alter its nature — and required providers to report it mandatorily. The notified rules remove this entirely. Providers now only need to inform the authority if they change how payments are facilitated, and only before doing so.
Krishnan was direct about why. “The notion of material change has been removed because of possible disputes which would arise on possible discretionary elements.”
The determination factors have been sharpened too. The draft had four broad parameters. The notified rules now separately distinguish between a registration fee for a competitive event, a subscription or access fee, and a bet or wager — distinctions that matter enormously for fantasy sports, e-sports, and gaming platforms that operate in the grey zone between the three.
Krishnan was also asked about offshore prediction markets like Polymarket and Kalshi — platforms where users are placing bets on Indian elections — and whether the government was aware of the scale of such activity.
Approximately $2-3 million is being wagered on the upcoming West Bengal election on such platforms, in real time.
Krishnan acknowledged the government had not been tracking Kalshi specifically. “We weren’t aware of that,” he said, adding that Polymarket had previously been brought to his notice and action had been taken.
“If there is this, we would certainly” act, he said of Kalshi.
On the broader question of Indians accessing such platforms through VPNs, he said the government was trying to regulate VPNs more effectively but acknowledged the difficulty.
“The problem is that there are many legitimate users of VPNs. How do you distinguish between the legitimate and the illegitimate users is the big question.”
On payment channels used for such transactions, Krishnan said the new rules’ financial institution compliance obligations were relevant: banks and payment processors would have to examine whether they were facilitating transactions for prohibited platforms.
“If it is India-based… depends on what comes to notice. If they have been reported, they’ll either be blocked or action will be taken on the relevant sources in India.” He also pushed back on any reading of the rules as a loosening of the regulatory framework.
“Don’t come back and say, oh, you have loosened it. We have not loosened anything,” he said. “It does not mean that an online money game can come in and be played. If it is an online money game and we find it is an online money game, action under the Act will be taken.”
One entire grievance tier deleted
The draft rules routed user complaints through three levels: game provider, then the Grievance Appellate Committee under the IT Intermediary Rules 2021, then the authority.
The notified rules cut the Grievance Appellate Committee out completely. Users now go from provider to authority to the Appellate Authority — the MeitY Secretary — with 30 days at each stage. A layer of bureaucracy that existed on paper for seven months has been removed before it ever functioned.
Registration certificates, where required, are now valid for up to 10 years. The draft had set this at five. Both versions are game-specific and provider-specific — a point Krishnan emphasised: “It can’t be the same game, different publisher.”
An entire section on promotion deleted
The draft had a Part II devoted to promotion of e-sports and online social games, splitting responsibilities between the Ministry of Youth Affairs and Sports and the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting. The notified rules drop this section in its entirety.
“That is largely a matter of policy that need not find place in basic rules,” Krishnan said.
Also gone is a transitional provision from the draft that required banks to refund user deposits held before the Act came into force within 180 days. Krishnan indicated the problem had already worked itself out.
Both versions place banks in the compliance chain. But the notified rules go further: banks must verify a game’s registration certificate before facilitating any transaction for a registered social game or e-sport.
When the authority issues a direction on an online money game, banks must without delay suspend or cut off related transactions entirely and provide the authority whatever information it asks for. No equivalent proactive verification obligation existed in the draft.
The ban on online money games is total and unchanged. “Money games are banned. Money games cannot come under determination. If we determine someone’s money games, then we have to take action against them,” Krishnan said.
(Edited by Ajeet Tiwari)
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