Why Do We Gamble?

THE EARLIEST INSTANCE of gambling in Indian history is also in its oldest scripture—the Rig Veda. In the 10th Book, the last of the lot, when that society possibly became less nomadic and began to settle, there is what is known as the gambler’s lament. It is a hymn about ruin. “My wife holds me aloof, her mother hates me: the wretched man finds none to give him comfort./ As of a costly horse grown old and feeble, I find not any profit of the gamester.” The author of the verse recognises gambling for what it becomes—an addiction. By modern interpretation, any habit subtly treads over the compulsion line when it starts having unsalutary effects on one’s daily life. And the Rig Vedic seer knew it well, which is why he paints a graphic image of the destruction in process: “When I resolve to play with these no longer, my friends depart from me and leave me lonely./ When the brown dice, thrown on the board, have rattled, like a fond girl I seek the place of meeting./ The gamester seeks the gambling-house, and wonders, his body all afire, Shall I be lucky?/ Still do the dice extend his eager longing, staking his gains against his adversary./ Dice, verily, are armed with goads and deceiving and tormenting, causing grievous woe./ They give frail gifts and then destroy the man who wins, thickly anointed with the player’s fairest good.”

The gambler’s lament is intriguing to scholars because the Rig Veda is primarily a scripture where deities are propitiated through the chanting of verses. It is therefore a religious text. But the lament is a secular hymn. It could very well be something written today by an addict if you discount the brief mention of one deity. AL Basham in The Wonder That Was India says that the hymn didn’t begin as a non-religious one even if it is the most famous one in that category in the Rig Veda. In fact, it might have begun as exactly the opposite of what it became. He writes: “Probably the poem was originally a spell to ensure success in gaming, addressed to the vibhīdaka nuts (from which dice are made) themselves. This was converted by an anonymous poet into a cautionary poem, which obtained a place in the g Veda on account of its reference to the god Savit as attempting to reform the gamester.” The gambler’s lament tells you that Indians’ relationship with gambling has been both timeless and yet an evolving one. In the Mahabharata, one of the texts that underpin Hinduism, it is a game of dice, in which Yudhishthir throws away all of what he owns including his kin and himself, that propels the story to its finale.

THE LESSON THAT parents tell their kids when this episode comes up is that gambling is a one-way street to ruin. But these same parents will happily join a game of cards with real money at stake during a Diwali party because, by that peculiar hangover of religion from ancient times, all vices are given an outlet—an occasional release of a safety valve in society. No one thinks the worse of anyone who wins or loses a couple of lakh during Diwali gambling. No policeman will come knocking on doors, even though the legality of it is undecided, with different high courts giving different opinions. Every gamble is par for the course on that day just like the drinking of bhaang, a narcotic, during Holi. But what happens when there is a pandemic afoot and the party no longer can be held? Diwali gambling takes a digital leap, and online gambling sites begin to make hay. Last year, the news agency PTI ran a report on this phenomenon and in it there was a quote from an unnamed young man who had lost ₹ 2 lakh gambling during Diwali the previous year and was looking forward to making it up only to come to know that no invitations were forthcoming because Covid-19 had made gatherings history. But on offer for him was the alternative, a slew of apps from online gambling Indian startups. The same report had a quote from one such startup founder who said business had spiked fivefold during Diwali. This year will be no different, because even though the pandemic is on the wane, the phenomenon began much before it. In 2019, The New Indian Express published an article titled “Online Poker gaining ground during Diwali” in which one gambling app CEO said the number of players on the platform had risen by 30 per cent during Diwali. Almost all such apps have special marketing drives for the festival.

Online is the latest iteration in India’s gambling story. As India evolved, gambling metamorphosed. A Diwali party’s gambling is associated with card games, but in its earlier avatar, it was dice and its mythological beginning with a female goddess in fact setting off the tradition. That goddess is Parvati, wife of Shiva, one of the Hindu trinity. In an essay titled ‘The Non-Monetary Uses of Money in Hinduism’ researchers at the University of California, Irvine’s anthropology department say: “An unusual custom, which characterizes the festival of Diwali, is gambling, especially in north India. It is believed on this night, the Goddess Parvati played dice with her husband and enjoyed it so much that she decreed that whoever gambled on Diwali night would prosper throughout the coming year. Today, dice games have become obsolete in India and have been replaced by card games such as flush, rummy, and gin.” But Parvati is not the only goddess giving the sanction. Diwali is, after all, the festival to worship Lakshmi, overseer of wealth, and gambling could also be a reminder about the role of chance—don’t take her favours for granted. “On the other hand, some people claim to gamble on Diwali in order to remind themselves of the fickleness of lady luck (Lakshmi), and to create a sense of balance in the pursuit of material success,” the essay points out. Or it could just be because in an earlier era, the only time when people had extra wealth was after the harvest when Diwali is celebrated. And so they used it for recreation. “This may be the actual social origin of the unusual practice of gambling at Diwali, which now has acquired a divine sanction of recognition,” the essay adds.

The Indian state has always been schizophrenic about gambling. It recognised it as a vice but, like alcohol, vices also mean a lot of money if you tax them. Because no vice is ever eliminated in society, making it illegal merely drives it underground. The solution is to ghettoise and tax it. In the Arthashastra, Kautilya recommended the state have a monopoly on gambling. There would be a superintendent not just to regulate it but provide the avenue too while making a cut from the entire chain. He wrote: “The Superintendent shall take not only 5 per cent of the stakes won by every winner, and the hire payable for supplying dice and other accessories of diceplay, but also the fee chargeable for supplying water and accommodation, besides the charge for license.” All this despite Kautilya listing the evils of gambling by comparing it with other vices and at one point saying: “Lack of recognition of wealth properly acquired, acquisition of ill-gotten wealth, loss of wealth without enjoyment, staying away from answering the calls of nature, and contracting diseases from not taking timely meals, are the evils of gambling”.

To be certain that gambling is evil and then to set policy that tolerates it is not very different from the practice today. Except that the policy is an incomprehensible jumble. You periodically hear of cricket betting scandals. It was among the causes that led to the shake-up of the Board of Control for Cricket in India some time ago, after the son-in-law of the BCCI president was allegedly found to be betting on cricket matches. Before that, there had been periodic explosions of match-fixing scandals and the fixing was always in connection with those who bet on the game to rig it for profits. Making it legal, as sports betting is in many developed countries, would reduce match-fixing because what is legitimate is also transparent. Betting in cricket however remains illegal in India. That, one would think, stems from the moral case against gambling. However, betting on horse races continues to be considered perfectly legal. This might be a hangover from colonial days and has been challenged in the judiciary, which still upheld it using the argument that betting on horses is a matter of skill and not chance. One can’t tell what number will come up when one throws the dice, but in horse races, one can carefully study the field and come to a considered conclusion of the outcomes. True, but this exact line of reasoning can be used for betting on cricket too.

Also, if use of skill is what can make gambling legal, then how are lotteries being sold in India? There is really nothing anyone can do to predict a lottery, but in nearly half of all Indian states, they are freely sold, and in fact by the governments. The website of the Directorate of Kerala State Lotteries has this self-congratulatory message: “Kerala, the Gods own country [sic], added another first to its cap in 1967, when a lottery department was setup for the first time in India. The right idea came from the then Finance Minister of Kerala, the late Shri P.K. Kunju Sahib, who envisaged revenue from sale of lotteries as a major source of non-tax revenue for the state, at the same time providing a stable income source for the poor and the common… With its humble beginning, the department was to set an example for the entire country. Soon many other states jumped into the bandwagon by starting their own lotteries… The department now rolls out seven weekly lotteries viz. Pratheeksha, Dhanasree, Win-Win, Akshaya, Bhagyanidhi, Karunya and Pournami lotteries and six bumper lotteries.” If skill is the wall that separates gambling, every matka player in Mumbai would say that he has a system to beat the odds. The Maharashtra Lotteries website says that the state got into the business to wean people away from matka. That was 1969. But both matka and lotteries thrived together. The state makes a windfall from one and revenues from the other go to criminals and police who are bribed.

What makes gambling complicated is that the Constitution leaves it to the states to decide what they want to do about it.

A month ago, Karnataka passed a bill banning gambling. It made headlines because online betting, which is in a grey zone elsewhere, also came under its purview. But the law also had fine print. An Indian Express article said: “The amended law covers all forms of wagering or betting “in connection with any game of chance” with the exception of horse races and lotteries.” And then there is Goa which even allows casinos. The irony of an activity being a crime at one location of the country and harmless recreation in another doesn’t end there. The state recently came out with rules that barred gambling in those casinos for locals. How something can be good when a tourist does it but becomes a sin for a local is the enduring story of gambling here.

ArthashastragamblingIndian societyKautilyasanctionWealth Issue 2021