A sattebaj (bookie or fixer) facilitates sports betting and other gambling activities. To keep things as simple as possible, a sattebaj accepts bets from players and then pays out the winners.
The way a sattebaj makes money is through the “vigorish”. The vigorish or “vig” is the commission a sattebaj charges to accept a wager. In a perfect world, it guarantees the sattebaj makes a profit.
The easiest way to explain how a sattebaj makes money is with the coin flip example.
Let’s say one person wants to bet ₹5000 on heads and another person wants to bet ₹5000 on tails. If these two people knew each other, they could simply bet against each other with no vig.
However, a sattebaj facilitates betting between other parties and would therefore charge vig.
In this example, the sattebaj won’t offer even-money odds (2.00), but instead offer each bettor 1.90 odds. Instead of each player having to risk ₹5000 to win ₹5000 profit in the initial example, they would now need to risk ₹$5500 to win ₹5000 profit. This guarantees the bookie makes a ₹500 profit.
Regardless of the result (heads or tails), the sattebaj will payout the winner ₹10,500 from the ₹11,000 pot (₹5500 stake returned and ₹5000 profit). This will leave the fixer with a guaranteed ₹500.
Now imagine multiplying that by 100 or 1000. Instead of making ₹500, the sattebaj would make ₹50,000 or ₹500,000 respectively. The profits grow quickly as the bookie increases betting volumes.
No matter what the odds are for a match, the sattebaj will always add the vig to every wager.
The Indian sports betting market is massive and growing quickly despite being unregulated.
Several gambling studies in the country in the past decade have estimated that 80% of Indians will place at least one wager annually on sports, slots or casino games.
Since the industry is mainly unregulated, statistics and data are hard to come by. However, to give you an idea of the sheer size of the Indian sports betting market, consider the following:
In 2018, the Thane anti-extortion cell (AEC) estimated that ₹6,000 crore was wagered in Mumbai alone during the 2018 Indian Premier League (IPL), which illustrates the amount of money being bet.
There are millions of Indians looking for a trustworthy sattebaj to place bets with.
New Delhi, Mumbai and Kolkata may be the most populous cities in India, but there are already 40 cities in India with more than one million inhabitants. In a recent study, it was predicted that there will be 68 cities with a population greater than 1,000,000 by the year 2030.
There is no other country on earth with the sheer volume of bettors than India.
India has the seventh largest economy based on GDP ($2.72 trillion) thanks in large part to a labour force that stands at 496,960,163 million and counting. With a fast-growing economy (predicted to be third biggest by 2030) and a growing middle-class with more discretionary money, there are more people than ever in India looking to enjoy themselves by gambling.
Internet and Smartphones More Prevalent
Statistics have proven that the number of Indians will access to the internet is on the rise.
In 2016, it was estimated that 342.65 million people in India had access to the internet. That number has grown rapidly annually and the latest statistics show there were 636.73 million internet users in 2019. By 2025, it has been predicted that there will be nearly one billion internet users in India.
Smartphone usage is growing just as quickly. A new report released in December 2019 estimated that there were 502.2 million smartphone users and 77% of those users were online.
Studies have shown that the majority of Indians prefer gambling on mobile devices. If you want to be a bookie in India then you absolutely must ensure your website is mobile-accessible.
Based on these statistics, there are hundreds of millions of potential clients for a sattebaj with the right business plan, expertise and marketing, which are three areas where we help out.
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It is illegal to be a sattebaj in India, but there are thousands of bookies operating in every city in the country. Most Indian states have adopted the Public Gaming Act of 1867, which prohibits any one from running or being in charge of a public gaming house.
The punishment is a ₹200 fine and up to three months imprisonment, but as long as you’re smart, follow our business plan and keep your head down, you’ll be fine as a sattebaj.
In India, it’s legal to bet on horse racing because of an amendment to the Public Gaming Act, but it still isn’t legal to run a racebook. Lotteries, fantasy sports and poker are also legal to gamble on.
In the state of Sikkim, online sports betting is legal under the Sikkim Act, making Sikkim the only state with licensed online sports betting. In India, it’s up to individual states to regulate gambling.
The only three states in India with legal gambling (land-based casinos) are Sikkim, Goa and Daman.
What’s most important to understand about the legal landscape for a sattebaj in India is that the laws prevent you from operating, but the penalties are small and rarely enforced.
It’s also not illegal for Indians to place bets online with offshore gambling companies. Indians are allowed to gamble with offshore gambling platforms as much as they want.
Online betting is growing in popularity in India and isn’t as “taboo” as land-based gambling. This is especially true among the younger generation, which will be your target market as a bookie.
Being a bookie in India means more than 90% of the bets you accept will be on cricket.
The entire country loves cricket and there’s no sport that even comes close in popularity. When the Indian national team or IPL is on, the entire country tunes in on television.
In 2018, the International Cricket Council (ICC) performed a huge study on cricket fans. The study concluded that there are more than one billion cricket fans worldwide with 90% being Indians.
The majority of your profits will come from cricket as a sattebaj.
Here are just some of the major events that draw in millions of Indian bettors:
• Indian Premier League (Professional Twenty20 Cricket League)
• Ranji Trophy (Domestic First-Class Cricket Championship)
• Duleep Trophy (Domestic First-Class Cricket Competition)
• Deodhar Trophy (Domestic List A Cricket Competition)
• Irani Cup (Annual Fixture Featuring Ranji Trophy Winners vs. Rest of India Team)
• Vijay Hazare Trophy (Domestic Limited-Overs Cricket Competition)
• Syed Mushtaq Ali Trophy (Domestic Twenty20 Cricket Championship)
• ICC Competitions (Cricket World Cup, World Twenty20, Test Championship, etc.)
The busiest time of the year for a bookie in India is during the IPL, but any time the Indian national team is playing an ODI there will be millions of Indians looking to place bets online.