On the early morning of May 1, 2026, in an office in New Delhi, India, Harsh Jain, co-founder of Dream11, stared at his mobile screen, which popped up the message: "The PROGA Act is officially in effect, all real-money gaming operations must cease immediately."
At that moment, the nightmare of the Indian gaming industry officially began. This market, once valued at $50 billion and hosting 591 million players, became the world's largest real-money gaming market, was completely obliterated by a single piece of legislation.
The story begins on August 21, 2025, when the Indian Parliament passed the "Online Gaming Promotion and Regulation Act" (PROGA) with a high vote in both houses. The core of the act is that any online games involving entry fees, betting, or monetary returns are strictly prohibited.
Whether skill-based or luck-based games like online Rummy, poker, or fantasy sports, all are considered "online real-money games."
The news broke that day, and the CEO of Games24x7 called an emergency meeting of executives. Its platforms RummyCircle and My11Circle, which accounted for nearly half of India's online Rummy market, became illegal businesses within a day. Less than a month later, the company announced a 70% layoff, with over 500 employees leaving.
Throughout the second half of 2025, the industry fell like dominoes. MPL, WinZO, PokerBaazi, Gameskraft, and other platforms gradually shut down their real-money operations. The Irish giant Flutter's Junglee Games, which was expected to contribute $200 million in revenue and an EBITDA of $50 million from the Indian market in 2025, went to zero overnight.
After the act took effect on May 1, 2026, the aforementioned leading companies all exited the real-money field. Dream11, once a national platform paying about $400 million in sponsorship fees annually, not only terminated its contract with the Indian cricket team (BCCI) but also completely shut down its core business, shifting to the free platforms FanCode and Cricbuzz. This platform, which suddenly disappeared from public view.
🪙The losers' $3 billion tearful bill
This dramatic change caused the greatest losses to the investors behind the scenes.
Over the past five years, top global VCs such as Tiger Global, Steadview Capital, TPG, and Sequoia India have invested more than $3 billion in the Indian real-money gaming industry. Tiger Global alone invested over $1 billion in Dream11 and Games24x7; Steadview invested about $500 million in Games24x7; SoftBank Vision Fund also invested hundreds of millions of dollars in Dream11.
Dream11 was once valued at $5 billion, and Games24x7 at $2.5 billion, with over 90% of their core revenue coming from real-money operations. After the sweeping ban, their valuations collapsed, and there was no exit for the investments. This might be the biggest single-country, single-industry loss in the global VC industry for 2025-2026, comparable to the approximately $5 billion loss caused by China's "Double Reduction" policy in 2022.
🎰Direct halving of the gaming industry's market revenue
In 2025, the total revenue of the Indian gaming market was $5.9 billion, of which real-money games accounted for 82% (about $4.8 billion), and mobile gamers were 532 million, nearly 90% of the total 591 million players.
After PROGA, the forecasted total revenue for 2026 plummeted to $1.5-2 billion, a 70% drop year-over-year. Fantasy sports and online Rummy categories almost disappeared, while other gaming categories like esports/FPS surged from 10% to 45%, and casual games rose to 28%.
The former high-spending real-money players (males over 30) largely moved to the grey market, 🔴data shows that after PROGA, the proportion of Indian players turning to overseas gambling websites rose from 68% to 82%.
On May 29, 2026, 28 days after the act took effect. On the streets of Delhi, young people were still playing "BGMI" on their phones, while the once bustling real-money gaming apps had all disappeared from the app stores.
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