Betting Culture & IPL

Digital payment firms have experienced a 50 per cent surge in demand as their usage doubled since the start of the COVID-19 crisis. With digital platforms dominating the country, a survey from LocalCircles found that a majority of Indians feel advertisements from gambling platforms an area of concern.

- Indrishka Bose

Recently, Google decided to pull down the Indian Premier League (IPL 2020) Umpire sponsor, Paytm app and its fantasy sports app from Google play store, a day before the start of the IPL 2020 tournament.

Prithvijit Majumdar, a resident of Chennai believes betting in IPL constantly degrades its quality and the enthusiasm with which fans have watched these matches over time.

Even though sports betting is banned in India, fantasy sports are still not illegal in many parts of India.

In a blogpost, Paytm announced the entry of ‘Paytm Cricket League’ on its consumer app, where users receive player stickers after each transaction, collect them and receive Paytm cash-back.

Google, showing absolute displeasure on the subject said that if an app leads the consumers to an external website and allows them to participate in paid tournaments to win cash prizes then it is a clear violation of its policies.