Sectors · Technology and services
Gaming and online platforms
Online gaming and platform businesses sit under the online gaming regulatory framework, GST enforcement on platform receipts, intermediary liability under the IT Act and the data protection regime, each of which has moved in the last three years.
Reviewed
What this covers
- Online gaming regulatory compliance and MeitY questions
- GST structuring and disputes for gaming platforms
- Intermediary liability and IT Act compliance
- Digital Personal Data Protection Act compliance
- Fantasy sports and skill gaming regulatory questions
- Content moderation and takedown disputes
- Foreign investment structuring for digital platforms
- Defence of regulatory investigations and show-cause proceedings
The notes behind these capabilities
The Promotion and Regulation of Online Gaming Act, 2025 came into force on 1 May 2026, and it does not regulate online money games. It prohibits them, together with their advertising and the banking that pays for them, and it reaches a service operated from outside India for players inside it. The definition that carries the prohibition is drafted to make the old skill and chance argument irrelevant, so a rummy or fantasy platform is in the same position as a casino product. What the Act promotes is a narrower set: e-sports recognised under the National Sports Governance Act, 2025, and online social games played without stakes, both of which register with an authority rather than being left alone. The liability a closed platform leaves behind is the tax, and on 27 May 2026 the Supreme Court held the stake, not the commission, to be the measure of it.
Reference
Regulators in this sector
Forums
Practice areas that apply
- Boardroom and corporate
- Transaction advisory
- Capital markets
- Contracts and procurement
- IP and licensing
- Civil disputes
- PMLA
- Technology, data and product
- Employment
- Taxation and fiscal
- White-collar and cyber defence
- AI, data and emerging technology
- Cyber crime
- Public law and public interest litigation
- Technology disputes
- Money recovery
- Foreign exchange (FEMA)
- Prevention of sexual harassment (POSH)
- Employee's Compensation
- GST disputes
Advocates in this sector
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