Addicted to online gambling, traders, youths lose lakhs every day

Ongole: The people who are habituated to online gambling in the name of Matka and Roulette from western mandals of the Prakasam district and neighbouring Guntur and Kurnool districts, are losing lakhs of rupees on a daily basis.

The punters are ruining the lives of their relatives and friends by dragging them into the game for the incentives like referral bonus. The people who lost jobs and income made a habit of playing these online lucky games to hit the jackpot at once, but are ending up in heavy debts and losing the family property.

Meanwhile, the district police officials announced that they would conduct a special drive to track down on the people involved in gambling and their dealers, with the support of technology and other government agencies.

Bhukya Somanaik lost his job in Hyderabad and returned to his native place in Markapur mandal in January. His friends introduced him Matka game, a game in which the punter bets on a number and gets the money if the same number is selected for the prize.

He started with Rs 50 per number and gradually spent more than Rs 1.50 lakh, including his PF amount of nearly Rs 1.20 lakh. Similar to Somanaik, about 20 people from his village with a population of 1500 spent Rs 40 lakh on betting for the last one year, but only one person is able to win Rs 14000 once.

Nakka Sivareddy of Peddaraveedu mandal spends Rs 1850 on each game of roulette. He simply bets Rs 50 on all 37 numbers on the game, as it guarantees to win of Rs 1500. If he is lucky enough, he gets the prize 100 fold or even 500 fold. He won about Rs 1.50 lakh once and about 30 people started playing the Roulette game inspired by him.

Matka or Satta Matka game is designed and populated by Ratan Khatri and Kalyanji Bhagat. It is available in various formats like open, close, jodi, panel, sangam and jackpot. It is being played in the name of Rajdhani, Madhur, Super, Kuber along with the city names Kalyan, Delhi, Faridabad, Gaziabad, etc.

The Matka beaters appoint agents to discreetly function in many States including Andhra Pradesh and Telangana. Though Matka is being played by many people in the Prakasam and neighbouring districts regularly, the number of punters is increased since the return of people to the native places due to the Covid pandemic. The availability of technology and affordability of smartphones multiplied the number of punters and they are logging in to the apps and websites to register their bets.

Meanwhile, the increase in the number of punters also gave the opportunity to earn to others. The websites and apps are offering the users a referral bonus on the amount deposited by the users referred by them. The experts in the Matka game started WhatsApp and Telegram groups, to share the tips and tricks for a subscription price.

When asked the few of the punters in Markapuram, Giddalur, Darsi, Kanigiri, Srisailam, Vinukonda, Narasarao Pet Assembly constituencies, how they are managing the money to bet, a number of them confessed that they are taking private loans and spending the money being distributed by the government in the name of various schemes and programmes.

The trend of taking loans from private persons is resulting in many families lose their property and occasionally ending up in quarrels. Responding to such incidents, the Prakasam district SP Siddharth Kaushal said that the Police department is focussed on controlling illegal activities like transportation of alcohol from other States, preparation of arrack, smuggling of ganja and gutkha etc.

He said that the department will be focusing on the control and eradication of betting on Matka and roulette soon. He said that though the punters are using websites and apps for betting and making payments through the UPI apps, the Police department will take help from technology and other agencies in the government to track and nab the betting people.