Bans won't kill gambling

In the 1930s, contract bridge maven Ely Culbertson, who also owned a playing card manufacturing business, went on a tour of the Soviet Union.

- DEVANGSHU DATTA

In the 1930s, contract bridge maven Ely Culbertson, who also owned a playing card manufacturing business, went on a tour of the Soviet Union. He was told that sales of cards in the USSR were down 40 per cent year-on-year, and the commissars hoped sales would fall by at least 20 per cent annually until they dropped to zero.

When he asked why, it was explained that Comrade Stalin wished to eradicate gambling and, therefore, shut down all card games. But it had been discovered that if local cards were unavailable, Russians would play with smuggled Swedish ones. Hence, the Soviets continued producing cards, while "re-educating" inveterate gamblers — if necessary by sending them to the Gulag — to wean them off the dangerous habit.

Stalin died in 1953. The USSR died in 1991. There are still many excellent bridge and poker players in the successor Commonwealth of Independent States. Similarly, the Islamic regime of Iran banned cards because of the association with gambling. That ban was unenforceable. Iranians continue to play card games, albeit discreetly, using smuggled cards.