Indian police bust illegal cricket betting gang
Police in Visakhapatnam have arrested two people who were raising bets on cricket matches.
India.- Special Enforcement Bureau (SEB) officers in Komadi have arrested two people who were allegedly members of a cricket betting gang. The Hindu reported that police arrested Md Shariff, 30, from Madhurawada and Abbireddy, from Kommadi Suresh (33), on deposit in a raid on Sunday.
Officers reportedly confiscated the bank accounts of the two defendants, which contained around £12,000, an ATM card and two mobile phones, which they handed over to Maduravada police for further investigation.
A week ago, police in Jalandhar arrested six people on charges of betting during an Indian Premier League (IPL) cricket match. In a raid at the Urban Estate Phase I area, officers seized a suitcase having 19 mobiles, five laptops and chargers and three WiFi setups among other electronic items and Rs 1,300.
Cricket remains India’s most popular sport. There is a huge underground cricket betting market said to be worth between US$45bn and US$150bn a year. Around 80 per cent of illegal sports betting in India is on Cricket.
India considers regulating online gambling
As more states begin to rethink the idea of banning gambling due to missed potential tax revenue, authorities are considering the possibility of establishing a regulatory regime for online gambling. According to local media reports, the government now wants to curb increasing illegal operations by creating a new regulator.
Through the Online Gambling Regulation Act, the government would create a central gambling regulator, the Online Gambling Commission, with a mandate to oversee the operations of online gambling operators and punish illegal operators. It would have the power to issue, suspend and revoke licences for online gambling.
The committee would also have the power to make rules related to licensing, including on who is eligible to gamble.
To date, apart from the Supreme Court’s precedent on skill-based gambling, there is no federal statute to govern India’s gambling industry, with each state taking its own stance on the issue.
