Gambling in India

Gambling as a pastime has always been popular in India and continues to be so even in present-day India. Currently, most forms of gambling are illegal in India except for the state-run lotteries (and that too only in some states), horse racing, rummy card games and casinos (in only two of the twenty nine states). However many Indians gamble illegally: India has a huge illegal betting market and betting on sports such as cricket is extremely popular. Despite this, gambling in India is seldom seen as a potentially addictive behaviour in academic discourse, policy debate or clinical patient-doctor assessments, and consequently has received little attention from academics, policy makers and mental health professionals. However some of this is beginning to change: research has emerged recently suggesting that gambling and gambling-related problems are a matter of concern among Indians. Also, the Indian Psychiatric Society (file:///C:/Users/sanju.george/Downloads/OTHER%20PUTATIVE%20BEHAVIOURAL%20ADDICTIONS.pdf) in 2015 published a booklet on behavioural addictions and gambling addiction features significantly in it.