The government on Monday issued two separate advisories for private television channels and news websites, urging them to refrain from showing advertisements of online betting sites and surrogate advertisements of such sites.
“It had come to the notice of the government that several sports channels on television, as well as on OTT platforms, have recently been showing advertisements of offshore online betting platforms as well as their surrogate news websites,” the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting said.
The advisory comes in the light of significant financial and socio-economic risk for the consumers, especially youth and children, it said.
The advisories were supplemented with evidences which contained direct and surrogate advertisements of offshore betting platforms such as Fairplay, PariMatch, Betway, Wolf 777, and 1xBet, the ministry said in a statement.
It noted that online offshore betting platforms were using news websites as a surrogate product to advertise the betting platforms on digital media.
In such cases, the logos of surrogate news websites bear striking resemblance to betting platforms, it said.
"Moreover, the Ministry has stated that neither the betting platforms nor the news websites are registered under any legal authority in India. Such websites are promoting betting and gambling under the garb of news as surrogate advertising," the statement further said.
Since betting and gambling is illegal in most parts of the country, advertisements of these betting platforms as well as their surrogates are also illegal, the ministry said, adding that its advisories relied upon the provisions of the Consumer Protection Act 2019, Cable TV Network Regulation Act 1995 and the IT Rules, 2021.
"The ministry has stated that such advertisements are not in conformity with various related laws and has strongly advised TV channels as well as digital news publishers from broadcasting such betting platforms or their surrogate news websites, reminding TV channels that violation may invite penal action. The ministry has also advised online advertisement intermediaries to not target such advertisements towards Indian audience,” the statement said.
The ministry had earlier issued an advisory on June 13, 2022, advising newspapers, private TV channels and digital news publishers to refrain from publishing advertisements on online betting platforms.