PokerStars India goes live

The traffic at PokerStars' Indian room has already exceeded its New Jersey sibling's.

Back in 2016, CEO of the company, Rafi Ashkenazi announced they were looking for expansion in the Asian markets, especially in India. The first big step of that procedure has finally gone down, after a long delay.
When asked about the delayed launch, PokerStars India CEO, Ankur Dewani said: "It’s very exciting to finally see the PokerStars brand come to India. As you can imagine, there is a great amount of preparation that needs to go into setting up a fully customized and local platform, and as much as it would have been great to have launched sooner, it’s good to take the time to get it right."

The Indian client of the world's biggest online poker site has started operating yesterday, offering cash games, tournaments and Spin and Gos to players. The regular SNG games are yet to be started. The currency of the site is Indian Rupee for all formats. The buy-ins for cash games vary between Rs 1/Rs 2 (USD 1.5c/3c) and Rs 500/Rs 1000 ($7.5/$15), both NLHE and PLO games available. The lowest and biggest Spin and Go games are Rs 1 (1.5c) and Rs 1,510 ($23). The tournament schedule offers familiar tournaments with the likes of Win the Button, Time Tourney, Knockout tournaments and the Bigs, Hots and Bounty Builders just like at the dot-com client.

According to Pokerindustrypro, the regular Sit and Gos are not available because of liquidity decisions, these games rarely run at other Indian sites. PokerStars.IN offers no sports betting or casino options as the site operates under legal interpretations of skill-based gaming. The site welcomes players with freerolls and first deposit bonuses. All deposits and withdrawals take place in INR only, including VISA, MasterCard, Maestro, online bank transfer and CashFree. Skrill, NETELLER, and player to player transactions are not allowed.


Muskan Sethi

Indian Muskan Sethi has joined the pro team of the site. Sethi is a well-known face in the Indian poker community, who resides in New Delhi. She used to be involved in the fashion and corporate world and worked as a social worker as well, before finding poker: “I didn’t get any satisfaction in the corporate or fashion world, so I started helping my mom with her social work. Then I found online poker. I felt like I finally found something special!” said the 27-year-old pro.

More than a thousand players have already registered to the welcome freeroll, foreshadowing a bright future. Ankur Dewani is optimistic about the future of poker in India: "65% of our population is below the age of 35, and by 2020 the average age is set to be about 29 years. If even a small percentage of this entire age take up poker, the industry will see a new boom and we hope that we can bridge that gap by educating the masses."

(photocredit: pokerindustrypro)