The Enforcement Directorate (ED) has frozen Rs 110 crore and seized 1,200 mule credit cards following searches against the Indian operations of Parimatch, a Cyprus-based online betting platform, for alleged money laundering and cheating investors.
Lacking basic safeguards and regulations, India is fast emerging as a hub for illegal online betting and gambling market, with the top 15 such unauthorised platforms logging an alarming over 5.4 billion visits in FY25, according to a report by public policy think-tank on consumer sovereignty.
'Illegal gambling operators are systematically exploiting India's advertising and payment infrastructure, siphoning off crores of rupees from outside the country.'
The scale of illegal gambling and betting in India is staggering, with 1.6 billion visits recorded between October and December 2024 across four analysed platforms -- Parimatch, Stake, 1xBet, and Battery Bet.
In 2025 alone, at least 50 suicides linked to online gambling losses have been reported across India. According to FIRs, the victims were addicted to betting, largely driven by cricket, rummy and poker.
'The larger and more opaque this shadow economy becomes, especially online, the greater the risk to India's national security.'
Amazon's rivalry in India with oil-to-retail conglomerate Reliance Industries looks set to head to the cricket field, where they will likely battle media heavyweights for telecast rights to the Indian Premier League (IPL) with its hundreds of millions of viewers.
