Govt asks Google to stop showing ads of betting firms

The announcement came after two months when the government advised online portals to refrain from promoting betting companies.

The Government of India has asked the search engine Google to stop displaying surrogate ads of betting companies in its search results. This came after two months when the government advised online portals to refrain from promoting these offshore companies.

According to a report, the ministry of information and broadcasting (MIB) has sent a letter to Alphabet Inc's Google India and asked the company to immediately drop all advertising, direct or surrogate, from betting platforms like Fairplay, PariMatch, Betway in search results and YouTube.

"After our last advisory on 3 October, TV channels and OTT (Over-the-top) players stopped showing surrogate ads of online betting firms, but it was brought to our notice that many such ads are running on YouTube and Google. We have asked Google to stop this immediately," said a senior ministry official.

The reason behind this advisory is that betting and gambling is prohibited in most parts of the country, and can pose significant financial and socio- economic risk for the consumers, especially youth and children.

“Accordingly, the promotion of offline or online betting/gambling through advertisements is not advised in the larger public interest,” the report stated.