Letters to the EDITOR: Online gambling

sentinelgroup@gmail.com

Online gambling

Through your esteemed daily, I would like to express my anguish about the online gambling in which many educated youths of our state have exhausted lakhs of hard-earned money from their parents. There is virtually no distinction between a drug addict and a person addicted to digital gambling. In the hope of gaining the lost money online, gamblers exert physical and mental pressure on their parents and elders to provide funds to buy online games. Big hoardings and signboards also attract many to play online games. Many families are bearing mental and physical torture from digital gambling-addicted youths. Such digital gamblers get involved in antisocial activities like theft, burglary, chain-snatching, etc. Surprisingly, the state government has taken no steps to either rehabilitate or provide counselling to such misguided youths or check online gambling in the state. Online gambling is not legal in the state. The issuance of statutory provisions for advertisement is not enough to check online fraud. Whereas the Bangladesh government has enacted an Act to prohibit online gambling, the Government of India and the state government remain silent spectators and are waiting for many more families to be lost due to the adverse effects of the deadly digital fraud. Sooner the government takes effective steps against the operators of cyber gaming, it is better for the youngsters to prevent themselves from getting trapped in their clutches.

Iqbal Saikia,

Guwahati