FA N TA S Y
The Legal and Tax Matrix of Fantasy Games Though legalised, fantasy sports are yet to get a status of ‘skill game’. We take a quick look at theperceived lack of legality and how the winnings are taxed ononline fantasy platforms.
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ver the last few years, the conception of fantasy sports platforms has created a new kind of sports followers who have learned to make money through fantasy platforms by just following their favourite teams and players. IPL has provided an excellent opportunity to attract new users to these platforms. So how do users benefit from looking at their favourite players and teams? How it all started? Fantasy sports competitions had started rooting in India from the early 2000s. However, it took almost a decade for the sector to become widely popular and accepted. In fantasy sports, players form a fictitious virtual team of their favourite sports. At present, a variety of fantasy sports game platforms have emerged in India, including Dream11, Mobile Premier League (MPL), MyTeam11, Halaplay, 11Wickets and My11Circle. Legality of online fantasy games in India The perceived lack of legality of online fantasy sports platforms, which support playing franchisees in the popular league, has been widely misunderstood, as have
By Akash Mishra the moral and aesthetic problems around real-money gambling. Skills games are legal in India and are not subject to Indian gambling legislation, mainly the Public Gambling Act of 1867. In regulating the platforms that offer such games, Indian law distinguishes betting on games of chance and betting on games of skill. Although participation and offering luck-dependent games are strictly prohibited, the law takes a more favourable position in skill games. In Dr K.R. Lakshmanan v. Tamil Nadu and Anirban, the court held that a game whose success mainly depends on the player’s knowledge of the game, training acquired, attention given, experience and proficiency should be classified as a skill game. Fantasy sports perfectly fit the bill because participants’ success mainly depends on their knowledge and statistical information about the game, their understanding of players, their performance in a specific field, and their knowledge of the game.
Players are required to choose their virtual team skilfully by assessing the players, with the limited credit points available at their disposal, and closely monitor the real game to win the virtual match. Hence, it cannot be prohibited under the Gaming Act. In the Gurdeep Singh Sachar v Union of India, the Bombay High Court also upheld the validity of the online fantasy sports platform Dream11, following the decision of the Punjab and Haryana High Court. However, the Supreme Court of India later put a stay on the operation of the decision by the Bombay High Court, and the issue remains unresolved.
Uncertainty still looms Owing to its uncertainty and chance The same judgement was passed in elements, fantasy sports easily gets the Varun Gumber v. Union Territory identified as a gamble. Therefore, of Chandigarh case. The High Court it’s safe to say that fantasy sports are wholly dependent on the virtual of Punjab and Haryana held that. G UTS H OT
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