India has blocked access to Polymarket as authorities move more aggressively against prediction-market platforms under the country’s online money-gaming rules.
The enforcement push has already taken Polymarket dark for local users after a government directive ordered internet providers to cut access to the platform. A formal block against Kalshi is also being prepared, with Indian authorities treating prediction markets as prohibited online money gaming rather than a permitted financial or information-market product.
The move targets a fast-growing category that lets users trade contracts tied to elections, sports, military operations, geopolitics, crypto prices and other real-world events. Polymarket runs through crypto rails and has become one of the most visible global prediction-market platforms, while Kalshi operates as a U.S.-regulated event-contract exchange. India’s position is much narrower: if users stake money on an outcome for potential reward, the product can fall into banned online money-game territory.
The crackdown follows months of pressure on platforms that continued serving or onboarding Indian users despite restrictions. India’s tech ministry had already warned intermediaries and VPN providers over access to banned betting and prediction sites, with authorities concerned that users were bypassing domestic blocks through VPNs and stablecoin payments.
That creates a difficult enforcement problem. Polymarket’s crypto-native structure can make payments easier to route through stablecoins, while Kalshi’s regulated U.S. status does not automatically make its products legal for Indian users. The result is a jurisdictional clash between global prediction markets and local gambling-style restrictions.
Kalshi Could Be Next
Kalshi’s risk is now more direct because the same logic used against Polymarket can be applied to event contracts offered to Indian users. A formal block would cut access at the internet-provider level, adding India to the growing list of jurisdictions where prediction markets are being treated less like neutral forecasting tools and more like regulated or prohibited betting products.
The timing is rough for the sector. In the U.S., Kalshi and Polymarket are already facing fresh political scrutiny after House Oversight Chair James Comer opened a probe into potential insider-trading risks tied to election and geopolitical markets. India’s action adds a separate pressure point: even if a prediction market can argue it is a financial product in one country, another regulator can still classify the same user activity as online gambling.
CryptoAdventure’s guide to prediction-market legal risk explains why this category keeps running into overlapping regimes. A single market can look like a derivative to one regulator, gambling to another and a crypto-native trading product to users. That tension is now playing out in India at the access-control level.
For Polymarket, the immediate impact is user access. For Kalshi, the issue is whether a U.S.-regulated structure can survive local enforcement in markets where online money gaming is banned outright. The next step will show up in ISP blocks, app access, VPN enforcement and payment routing, not just public policy statements.
India’s decision gives the global prediction-market industry a clear warning. Growth will not be judged only by volume, liquidity or accurate forecasts. Platforms also need country-level controls, user screening, payment restrictions and legal structures that can survive regulators treating event contracts as gambling rather than market infrastructure.
