’The Delhi-based Esports Players Welfare Association (EPWA), along with a group of professional gamers from Tamil Nadu, have challenged the recently introduced Tamil Nadu Regulations on Real Money Gaming, 2025 in the Madras High Court.
The Tamil Nadu Online Gaming Authority, on February 10, released new regulations for online real money games in the State, making the use of such platforms more stringent and tightly regulated. It completely prohibit minors from playing online real money games and make Know Your Customer (KYC) verification mandatory even for creating accounts on such gaming platforms. The login to the platforms is to be monitored by Aadhaar authentication followed by sending an OTP to mobile numbers, the regulations said.
The regulations also sets restricted hours for the gaming platforms noting that logging into the games should not be allowed between 12 midnight to 5:00 am.
The petitioner, P Vikram Kumar, a resident of Chennai, and a professional poker player having represented India in the World Series Poker Championship multiple times, said that the regulations infringe upon the fundamental rights of online gamers under the Indian Constitution under articles 14, 19 and 21, and severely impacting the professional gaming community.
States do not have the competence to pass such a regulation under the constitutional scheme and skill games can only be regulated by the Central government, under the Information Technology (Intermediary Guidelines and Digital Media Ethics Code) Rules, 2021. The regulation proceeds based on erroneous and non-existent data and is ex-facie arbitrary, says the petition filed in the Madras High Court, the petition says.
The regulations impose severe restrictions, including a ban on online gaming between 12:00 am and 5:00 am , which players argue is entirely disconnected from the realities of professional gaming. For many players, these are prime hours when they compete with the world’s best, including international players and officegoers who engage in competitive games after work hours.
State of India Gaming Report 2022, a collaborative study by Lumikai and Amazon Web Services (AWS) highlights that the number of esports players in India grew fourfold from 150,000 in 2021 to 600,000 in 2022. It also projects This number will reach 1.5 million by 2027, reflecting the rapid growth of the Indian gaming industry, says a release from EPWA.
EPWA, a Section 8 company, serving as a formidable players’ collective organisation. With the mission of bridging the gap between online gamers, industry stakeholders, and the government, EPWA strongly emphasises research and representation. Currently, it has a membership of 18,000 individuals nationwide, and encompasses enthusiasts from various online gaming genres, including AAA games, board games, card games, and other online gaming categories.
In Tamil Nadu, it represents a wide community of players, including PS Rathanvel, a chess prodigy. The list of petitioners also includes Aditya Sushanth Donka, a World Series of Poker Bracelet winner, and one of India’s most successful poker professionals.
EPWA and players have challenged these restrictions on three key grounds – violation of the Right to Livelihood; competitive Integrity and global participation and arbitrary arbitrary restrictions, the petition says.
