Exploring the Legality of Global Poker Industry: Special Emphasis on India

As far as poker legislation goes, the debate between skill vs. chance is futile as their comparative criteria are different. Advocates of poker as a game of chance primarily relate to the amateur players. The lawmakers are primarily concerned about this segment as increasing number of people are involved which increases the evils of problem gambling. Those who support poker as purely game of skill typically focus on the professional poker players. In the middle are those who prefer a middle ground between the two extremes. Some jurisdictions chose to not make any clear stand on poker legality because of advantages the game brings. In our view, law-makers primarily focus on the recreational level of players. National culture is known to influence the society and institutions there in. Therefore, we are dealing the impact of national culture on poker legislation. Based on national culture and economic indicators, we classified 150 countries into five clusters. We examined the effect of national culture in explaining the polarity towards legalizing poker. The study found that India belongs to a cluster which typically supports poker as midground. We argue that the national culture has a balancing effect in driving the India’s take on poker. The findings suggest the importance of contextual factors like national culture on survival and growth of a budding industry like poker.