The lottery has been around in India for decades and has always been quite popular, whether it’s the various movies about lotteries that Indians want to watch or the hope of winning their own by buying tickets from the state-run lotteries in parts of the country. But there is a new kind of lottery that is slowly taking over the Indian lottery market – online lottery through websites and apps.
In this growing age of digital media consumption and an everncr-easing demand for online entertainment, why would the lottery stay away from offering online options for long? The online gaming sector in India has grown to not only include various video games and gaming apps, but also related niches such as online betting, casinos, and now, the online lottery.
The online lottery has already seen astounding success and growth in the Indian as well as the global scale, with more and more people now switching to the convenience of purchasing their lottery tickets online. But what is it exactly that enables the online lottery to be a better choice for the consumer than traveling to a government lotto shop and buying tickets?
The first and easiest reason behind the sure-shot success of online lottery has to do with the convenience and ease with which users can purchase lottery tickets online. Especially during the pandemic, when people don’t even prefer going out to get groceries, it is hardly surprising that they would prefer to play the lottery online as well. In fact, mostly all modes of entertainment now being available on the internet, through laptops or smartphones, have made people more inclined to participate in the online lottery than they were ever before.
But is convenience the only factor that has contributed to the rise of the online lottery market in India?
That would seem to be untrue, especially since there are many factors that can be awarded this responsibility. For one, the recently popularized and impressive digital payments infrastructure in India can be held responsible for more people being inclined to play online games. Payment methods such as UPI apps and mobile wallets have allowed online gamers to quickly and simply deposit and withdraw money at the tap of a button. The simpler it is to spend money online, the more people want to do it!
Another factor that has greatly affected the upward trend of online lottery websites is the fact that India has been established as a strong market for mid-tier smartphones. With a massive demand for affordable as well as feature-rich smartphones, the Indian smartphone industry has managed to bring those sections of the Indian society online which previously did not have any access to the internet.
Added to that, the rivalry amongst the Indian telcos to provide even more competitive prices on internet data packs for mobile users has made it possible for everyone in India to be online for even longer. With more time spent on the internet, the online gaming industry has obviously seen a huge surge in the number of users, and it is estimated that more than 50 million Indians will be engaged in some or the other form of online gaming by the end of 2021.
Needless to say, the pandemic and its resulting lockdowns became the last push that the online gaming as well as the online lottery industry needed in order to consolidate their positions. The only question that remains is whether a possible end to the pandemic may bring down people’s ardor for the online gaming world?
