Supreme Court rejects Junglee Games appeal over Tamil Nadu rules
India's top court has thrown out a bid by Flutter-owned Junglee Games to revisit a ruling that upheld state bans on paid online skill games in Tamil Nadu and Karnataka.
A bid by Flutter Entertainment-owned Junglee Games and fellow operators to have India's Supreme Court reconsider a ruling against them has failed, according to SBC News.
The court dismissed the review petitions in an order dated 15 October, which only became public on 26 October, closing off a long-running legal fight over paid online skill games in two southern states.
The case traces back to 2021, when both Tamil Nadu and Karnataka amended their gaming statutes to target online betting and gambling activity. Operators including Junglee Games pushed back, contending that skill-based formats such as rummy are legally distinct from games of chance and should fall outside the reach of such bans.
That argument initially succeeded at state level. The Madras High Court struck down the contested Tamil Nadu provisions in August 2021, and the Karnataka High Court followed in February 2022 by voiding parts of its own state's law, effectively ruling in the operators' favour on both occasions.
The two states then took the fight to the Supreme Court, with Tamil Nadu lodging its appeal in December 2021 and Karnataka doing so in May 2022. The apex court ultimately reversed both High Court decisions in May 2026, reinstating the state restrictions and leaving operators to seek a rehearing through review petitions — the request now rejected.
The state-level litigation ran in parallel with a wider national shift against real-money gaming. India's Promotion and Regulation of Online Gaming Act, passed in August 2025, took effect on 1 May 2026 and has pushed operators either to exit the market or cease operations entirely, SBC News reported.
Junglee Games itself was founded in 2012 by Ankush Gera and grew into one of India's largest rummy platforms, at one stage reaching a player base of 120 million. Flutter took a 51% controlling stake in the San Francisco-headquartered studio in 2021, but has since withdrawn the brand from India altogether in response to the federal ban.
Flutter has not left the country entirely, however. The group continues to run a Global Capability Centre in Hyderabad employing more than 1,000 people, which provides finance, technology and data functions supporting its international brands, among them FanDuel, PokerStars, Betfair and Sky Betting & Gaming.