The Law Commission of India has recommended something that many in India are waiting for – legalise betting and gambling in sports. Gambling in India has always been restricted, apart from certain areas such as lotteries and horse racing. However, betting has been prevalent in the country for many years, especially in cricket matches.
Let’s face it, spot-fixing and match-fixing in cricket has happened mostly because of betting. Former India captain Mohammad Azharuddin was embroiled in the match-fixing saga along with South Africa’s Hansie Cronje by Delhi-based bookie Mukesh Gupta in the 1990s.
Even in 2013, when S Sreesanth, Ajit Chandila, Ankeet Chavan were caught for spot-fixing, 11 bookies were taken into custody along with them.
Betting has had a long-lasting relationship with spot and match-fixing for many years. Could legalising betting just mess things up a bit?
Tracking Betting Trends
Under a well-rounded betting system, the authorities can track the betting trends during a match or tournament. If huge bets are made on a particular activity, such as on whether a batsman will score a century or not, then the authorities can look into it and investigate if there’s any foul play.
If the legalised betting set-up is smartly structured, it can curb spot-fixing in cricket. Fixing an entire match is extremely difficult for a bookie, since the bookie will have to get all 11 players of a team to agree to set the result. But it is easier for the bookie to catch one or two players and lure them to carry out spot fixing. For a bookie, a more feasible option would be to get a player to bowl a no ball in the third ball of the 12th over.
Keeping this in mind, if the authorities ensure that all legalised betting centres will allow people to bet on things which would make it difficult for the bookies to spot-fix matches, then spot-fixing could be curbed in cricket.
The punters can place their bets on bigger things in cricket such as how much a team would score in an innings, who would score a century, who would take five wickets or who would win a match, and so on. The illegal betting system could take a big hit, provided a major chunk of punters prefer to place bets in a legalised format – which would subsequently result in the curbing of spot-fixing.
Economy Can Take a Hike
The Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce and Industry have stated that there is a possibility of the global sports betting market being worth up to $4 trillion. In a press release, Siddhartha Upadhyay, Co-Chair, FICCI Sports Committee & General Secretary said over Rs 300,000 crores of illegal business can be regulated.
It will boost the economy by regulating over Rs 300,000 crores of unregulated economic activities. The state government may have more funds to invest in the welfare activities and this should be directly linked to the sports broad-basing and developmental activities which often get ignored because of the paucity of funds.Siddhartha Upadhyay
If betting and gambling are legalised in India, then the government will make all the income from the activities taxable under the Income Tax Act, 1961 and the Goods and Services Tax Act, 2017. The revenue generated from betting will improve India’s gross domestic product (GDP) tremendously.
Is LCI’s Plan Far-Fetched?
Even though the Law Commission of India has recommended a valid move, they have included some ludicrous points for implementation in their plan.
LCI has said that people should attain licenses from the game licensing authority to operate betting and gambling centres. The transactions made by the betters and operators should be linked to their Aadhaar or PAN cards. But, how will authorities store all the Aadhaar or PAN card numbers and keep track?
LCI have also stated that punters should be allowed to place bets only a certain number of times over a period of time (monthly, half-yearly or yearly) and a person can gamble upto an amount prescribed by the law. Tracking each and every gambler’s transactions will be a tedious process for the authorities. It may not even be a feasible option.
To add to that, the LCI have stated that gambling should be classified into two groups – proper gambling and small gambling. In the proper gambling group, only persons with higher incomes will be able to place bets and persons in the small gambling group will place bets in the small gambling group. Punters in the small gambling group will not be allowed to bet high amounts.
It’s understandable that the LCI doesn’t want a person with lower income to take on a person with higher income, but is it even possible for the diktats at the betting centres to keep a track, who is from higher income group and who is from a lower income group?
Commission Member Disagrees
One of the commission members, Prof (Dr) S Sivakumar showed his dissent over LCI’s recommendation. First of all, Sivakumar stated that the LCI shouldn’t have considered legalising betting in sports since the Supreme Court mandated that LCI should consider legalising betting only in cricket.
That said, Sivakumar believes that legalising betting is not a good idea in India.
The socio-economic and cultural circumstances of the country are not pragmatic to accept legalised gambling activities, as it is still treated as a social stigma. In order to save the future generation from treading unethical paths, I am of the opinion that no form of gambling can be permitted from the soil of the country.S Sivakumar
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