Online Games Under Fire Again as Judge Requests Free Fire, BGMI Ban

Indian Judge, Naresh Kumar Laka has reportedly written to the Prime Minister of India (PMOI), requesting the ban of two online games: Free Fire and PUBG India (Battlegrounds Mobile India) stating that these games, similar to PUBG Mobile, cause “devastating adverse effects on the development of children”. He urged the government to enact a law restricting the exposure of children to such games. This recent call to ban the Battle Royale games incidentally comes after an online game firm was reportedly charged with a police case following the alleged suicide of a teen who allegedly lost a significant amount of money playing Free Fire.

Judge requests PM to ban games like Free Fire and PUBG India

As first reported by Times of India, in his message to the PM, Additional District Judge (ADJ) Laka thanked the Prime Minister for the ban of PUBG Mobile in 2020 and requested him to do the same for Free Fire and PUBG India.

Laka mentioned that children spend long hours playing online games which affect their normal life and influences their family and social behavior. He suggested that a law be framed to restrict exposure of children to such games.

Earlier in September 2020, the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology banned PUBG Mobile and several other Chinese apps, citing them to be “prejudicial to sovereignty and integrity of India, defence of India, security of state and public order.”

Deaths attributed to games like Free Fire and PUBG Mobile

This request incidentally comes shortly after a recent incident that reportedly occurred in the Indian state of Madhya Pradesh, where a police case was filed against an online game firm following a teen reportedly committing suicide after he allegedly lost INR 40,000 ($530 USD) by playing Free Fire. The state’s Home Minister gave a statement that the police of the state had been directed to take action against the developers of such games “which are disorientating the young generation and playing with their lives.” The Home Minister also added that they have sought the state Law departments’ opinion on initiating legal action against such companies.

This is not the first time that such deaths have been attributed to online games. In May 2019, according to The Times Of India, a teen from the same state died of cardiac arrest while playing PUBG Mobile. Another incident occurred in September 2020 when a 16-year-old reportedly committed suicide after being scolded for playing PUBG Mobile and having his phone taken, according to the Indian Express. Similarly in the same month, PUBG Mobile was banned in India which led to a 21-year-old reportedly committing suicide over the game’s ban.

This is not the first time online games have come under fire in the country. In June 2021, PMOI Narendra Modi criticized online games stating that many of these either promote violence or cause mental stress. The recently launched Battlegrounds Mobile India has already seen politicians appealing for its ban citing security threats.

Recently, in a now deleted report from Economic Information Daily, a subsidiary of Xinhua News, labeled online games a ‘spiritual opium’ for teens in China following which game companies’ stocks took a massive hit. Following these events, Tencent, one of the world's largest and leading gaming companies announced restrictions on their games, limiting the amount of time that minors can play their games and banned any person under the age of 12 from making in-game purchases.

This issue of addiction to online games in younger teens is not just restricted to a country or two but has roots everywhere in the world. Although the World Health Organization classified video game addiction as a mental disorder, it is a highly contested claim. The American Psychiatric Association has stated there is not "sufficient evidence" to consider video game addiction as a "unique mental disorder." And despite popular and political suggestions to the contrary, "there is insufficient scientific evidence to support a causal link between violent video games and violent behavior," according to the American Psychological Association.

Recently, Medianama posted a report which cited an Indian NGO, Distress Management Collective (DMC), filing a Public Interest Litigation (PIL), asking the Indian government to "consider national policy that protects the children of our country from online games addiction and further for constituting a regulatory authority to monitor and rate the content of both offline and online games."

With the increase of these types of incidents, it will be interesting to see if the Indian Government decides to regulate online games like PUBG Mobile, Free Fire, or BGMI.