Former Indian cricketer Shikhar Dhawan was on Thursday questioned for around eight hours by the Enforcement Directorate (ED) in an alleged illegal betting app-linked money laundering case, official sources said. He entered the office of the federal probe agency in central Delhi around 11 am and left after 7 pm. The agency recorded his statement under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA) as part of this investigation linked to an "illegal" betting app named 1xBet, the sources said.
The 39-year-old former India opener is understood to have been linked to the app through certain endorsements. The ED wants to understand his links with this app during the questioning.
The agency is probing multiple such cases involving illegal betting apps that are alleged to have duped numerous people and investors worth crores of rupees or have evaded a huge amount of taxes. Last month, former cricketer Suresh Raina was questioned in this case by the federal probe agency. More such sportspersons and celebrities are expected to be questioned by the agency in the coming days.
The Union government has banned real-money online gaming by bringing a legislation recently. According to estimates by market analysis firms and probe agencies, there are about 22 crore Indian users in various such online betting apps out of which half (about 11 crore) are regular users.
The online betting app market in India is worth over USD 100 billion which is growing at the rate of 30 per cent, according to experts. The government recently told Parliament that it has issued 1,524 orders from 2022 till June 2025 to block online betting and gambling platforms.
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