A Bench of Justice N. Kirubakaran and Justice B. Pugalendhi of Madurai Bench of the Madras High Court on remarked that “it is disheartening to note that several precious lives have been lost due to Online Gambling“.
A Writ Petition was filed seeking issuance of a Writ of Mandamus to direct the official respondents to take appropriate action to ban Online Rummy hosted by the seventh respondent and others. The Court went on to take judicial notice of the media reports on the number of persons died due to Online Gambling.
The Court said,
“Several youths, involved in Online Gambling, lost money and were unable to pay the debts which have been raised for Online Gambling and on account of that have also taken extreme step of committing suicide. It is reported Rs.25,000 Crores is involved in Online Gambling and wide publicity is being given to this killer gambling roping in celebrities which is one of the reasons for the popularity of the games.”
Considering the seriousness of the issue involved in the writ petition of Online gambling regulations, the Court suo motu impleaded “the Chief Executive Office (TORF), the Online Rummy Federation of India” as the eighth respondent.
The Court further remarked in case of online gambling regulations,
“This Court hopes that appropriate, adequate and immediate measures including bringing legislation to prohibit or regulate Online Gambling would be taken by the Government before the next hearing in order to ensure that no precious life hereinafter will be lost.”
