India Supreme Court to hear Tamil Nadu appeal on online gaming law
The Supreme Court will consider Tamil Nadu’s challenge to a Madras High Court ruling.
India.- The Supreme Court has agreed to hear an appeal filed by the Tamil Nadu government challenging a ruling by the Madras High Court that deemed Tamil Nadu’s online gaming ban to be unconstitutional.
The court has decided to consolidate the case with a previous appeal made by the Tamil Nadu government in 2022, which contested another Madras High Court ruling. This ruling struck down the Tamil Nadu Gaming and Police Laws (Amendment) Act of 2021, which had imposed a suspension on various online games.
Last April, The All India Gaming Federation (AIGF) and several real-money gaming firms filed a petition in the Madras High Court against the online gaming ban. The law, enacted by the state government, banned online rummy and poker, categorising them as games of chance and thereby subject to online gambling regulations. The move sparked a debate between the state and central government over jurisdictional authority.
In November, the Madras High Court upheld most aspects of the law but set aside provisions that banned skill-based online gaming. It empowered the state government to formulate regulations for the duration and age restrictions for such games.
The appeal also involves a challenge to an amendment made to the Tamil Nadu police law in 2021, which prohibited all forms of online gaming following an incident where a woman took her own life due to losses incurred from online gaming. The Madras High Court had earlier declared this amendment unconstitutional, prompting the government’s appeal to the Supreme Court.
