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2. Casino Pride, Goa

Casino Pride | #2 out of Best 7 Casinos in Goa

Excitement and fun get a new meaning at the extremely exciting gaming destination called Casino Pride. This 30,000 sq. ft. of floating world hovers on the cool waters of the Mandovi River. Adorned with golden-hued embellishments, the casino boasts of a great ambiance and makes for one of the most happening places to visit in Goa.

Casino Pride Panaji, Goa is spread over three floors and can indulge 500 guests at a time with its exciting range of live games. This entertainment zone boasts of a 10,000 sq. ft. weather deck that is an excellent space for partying. Apart from numerous gaming slots and playing tables, the casino also has multi-cuisine restaurants, a barbeque, and a well-appointed bar to make sure that guests are taken care of in every way possible. Further, Casino Pride Goa has a special kid’s zone where the little ones can keep themselves busy with a whole lot of latest electronic gizmos and games. If you are looking for a fun-filled casino time in Goa with your kids in tow, now you know where to go!

• Location: Captain of Ports Jetty, Panaji
• Timings: 24×7
  •    Live Entertainment from 9:00 pm to 11:00 pm
• Entry Fee:
  • ₹ 1500 per adult Monday to Thursday (Includes one-time play coupon worth ₹ 500)   
  • ₹ 2000 per adult Friday to Sunday (Includes one-time play coupon worth ₹ 1000)     

Includes unlimited buffet and alcoholic drinks

Identifying The Best Online Casino Sites in India

In today’s time everyone call itself the best but identifying the real best is a major challenge. Here are few tips to identifying the best amongst the equals.

Here are few tips that will help you in identifying the best online Casinos in India. Start with looking at the Currencies, see if Indian Rupees Available. Next you need to check the payment methods, specially Indian mode of payment methods such as Master Cards, Visa, PayPal, PhonePe, RuPay and Paytm.

Goa As The Next Macau?

Over the last few years, there have been several credible rumours that the government is planning to revolutionize the gambling industry in the state. The Chinese gambling destination of Macau is reportedly the blueprint for these plans.

Macau started heavily liberalizing its casino industry in the early 2000s, resulting in huge investment by US and other foreign casino brands. Now, it is a major tourist and gambling destination rivalling Las Vegas.

There are several curious similarities between Goa and Macau – both were Portuguese colonies where gambling was legal for a long time. Now it seems that the Government plans to invite companies that could not invest in Macau to get a chance in the Goa casino resort industry. The local Goa people take casino pride in them and want to further expand their place as the world’s next big casino hotspot.

The new airport coming up at Mopa is widely seen as possibly linked with this mega-casino project. Unverified reports indicate that the project could lead to the creation of a $1 billion land-based casino market.

It could also potentially solve the perennial issues associated with boat casinos. Due to lack of suitable sites, boat casinos are being kept alive by frequent license extensions. With this new project, these casinos could be converted to land-based casinos.

But given the uncertainty surrounding the ongoing COVID-19 crisis, the future of this project is not clear. We will have to wait until the crisis passes to get clear signs.

Renowned Facilities offered by Majestic Pride Casino

Fine Dining: Enjoy the world-class quality food from three restaurants within the cruises offering a wide range of cuisines and distinctive alcoholic and non-alcoholic beverage options.

Deck: The charm of the deck in the cruise is embellished with a buffet setup, extraordinary open bar, and live music.

Accommodation: Majestic Pride Casino offers the amenity of 5-star rooms for equipping the visitors’ plans of stay. The casino is also accompanied by a spa, pool, gym, and many more facilities. You can extend your visit and enjoy the relaxing aura just after the thrill of trying your luck.

Live events: At Majestic Pride Casino, every day is a festival with the constant practice of entertaining the visitors. The provision of experiencing private parties and live performance certainly adds to the whole gambling experience.

Live casino games

Live games are one of the main reasons behind the feeling of a river or land-based casino. You can find live casino games at an online casino that comes with live streaming. You can watch live streaming and play the games with live dealers. There are various live casino games that you would find at online casinos in India, such as Roulette, Blackjack, card games like Poker, Teen Patti, and Andar Bahar. There are professional instructors known as live dealers who remain the same as the ones in land-based casinos.

How to Add Cash?

Since this is a cash gaming platform so you must need to spend money to play games. Adding money to the GOA Casino wallet is very simple I will recommend you add a small amount if you want to play seriously since this game has an element of risk so try to play with the small amount.

Steps to add cash:

• Open the app and click on the Wallet
• Then tap on Add Cash
• Enter or select the amount you want to deposit
• Next enter your full name, mobile number, and email address
• Now select the payment method and complete the payment
• Your money will be reflected in your wallet immediately

Financial and Economic Potential of Goa’s Gambling Industry

At the end of the day, any substantial investments and legislative initiatives that address gambling communities in Goa will need to have a sound economic and financial justification to go ahead.

Currently (or at least before the spring of 2020), the local gaming industry was annually drawing over three million tourists who brought precious external funds to the state. No matter which side of a discussion a Goan stands, they will hope to keep these revenue levels and even increase them.

Since 2012, the Government has reported casino contributions of almost Rs 1300 crore to the state budget. Offshore casinos tend to bring in almost twice as much as land-based ones (again, because of external cash flows from those 70% of tourists aboard).

We need to consider the last full financial year (FY19 with its Rs 411 crore revenue, as detailed earlier) to grasp the starting base of operations. However, other media reports cite calculations by opposing politicians who speak of over Rs 4,000 crore per year of lost revenue (~USD 0.5 billion) due to various leaks – including undocumented cash payments as a major fault. Put simply, the revenue potential for the State of Goa might be up to 10 times higher than what it has been lately.

In comparison, the US State of Pennsylvania might be more advanced economically, yet it is not anywhere near the international popularity of Goa as a gambling destination. Despite that – and having legalized casinos merely 15 years ago – Pennsylvania brings in the second-highest gaming revenue in the USA, behind only Nevada (with Las Vegas). Casinos and race tracks attract visitors from surrounding states and generate USD 2.5 billion in taxes for the local authorities, with over 33 thousand jobs supported (2018 data the last fully available). The total economic impact is reported at around USD 6.3 billion.

As much purchasing power as East Coast Americans might have, Pennsylvania still does not reach levels that Macao manages to reproduce year after year. This comparison proves that commercial gaming policy depends on surrounding conditions (infrastructure, supporting industries, etc.) but may rise above and beyond them in a matter of several years. We are reminded that Macao and Goa are both former Portuguese colonies and have started from a similar overall development level.

University of Nevada research explains that after its restoration to the Chinese Government in 1999, Macao (a Special Administrative Region, SAR) was working on its repositioning as a top-level tourism spot precisely by pushing liberal gaming and opening up to foreign operators (since 2002). The latter brought in the competitive edge and modernized both entrepreneurial culture and facilities. More than just symbolically, in 2006, Macao surpassed Las Vegas as the world’s largest gambling center.

The Macao Business board reported more than USD 23.5 billion in gaming revenues for 2010, a 58% increase on the previous year. More relevantly, the Gross National Product breakdown shows that casinos had an 11 percent share in 2001, rising to 80 percent in 2014. Admittedly, however, Macao cannot be an identically replicated business model for Goa, as we already emphasized its high-roller clients with particular tastes. VIP baccarat, for example, generates around 70% of total casino revenues across given years.

Goa, on the other hand, relies on a few large operators targeting the mass market. The Deltin Royale is a prime example, with up to 1000 physical gaming positions. However, should the state gambling industry wish to grow (sustainably), private operators and the Government should be open to alternative business models and platforms.

One particular paradigm shift would be the already suggested online operations. Practically unlimited in their capacity, they are safe against prolonged force majeure situations such as the recent pandemic concerns. Many of the “Key Reasons to Regulate a Gambling Market” are even more relevant with online casinos in mind.

Should more Indian companies and gaming operators be able to register and operate under Goan laws, they would increase manifold the economic impact and tax revenues that the segment can bring to the State and National public coffers.

When considering taxation and financial efficiency, numbers speak louder than any political statement. A 2019 KPMG report estimated the Indian betting market at $130 billion (₹9,50,000 crore) and in continuous growth for the past decade. The huge potential of India’s currently unregulated national markets is also re-evaluated more recently by the 2021 Deloitte India report. The latter cited online gaming alone as worth $2.8 billion (₹20,500 crores). Even though a much more contained amount, online games are growing rapidly by around 40% annually at this point and already represent 10% of the Union’s Media and Entertainment economy. The segment, again, is impenetrable to many of the global crises and indeed was shot into financial orbit by the stay-home urban culture as of late.

According to most taxation laws in India, about half of a company’s total turnover might end up as taxes. Based on the market size quoted above, online game operators would contribute around ₹53,000 crores in annual taxes by 2025-2026 (should they maintain current growth). Taxing the entire gambling sector in the country might bring in up to ₹6,60,000 crore in the same year, but that is currently not a manageable task for the entire Government, let alone a State.

Estimating taxation revenues from a regulated Indian gaming sector. Source: SevenJackpots.com

In any case, as many or as few of the country’s online gaming operators – and even foreign casino platforms – that Goa might be able to attract to operate under its jurisdiction, we are considering financial results which dwarf any tax collected by Central or State authorities at present. (And we are not including annual licensing fees and other charges).

Instead, Goa hotels and casinos are stuck waiting for news and a green light for the full reopening of the industry. Previous Unlock stages did not include them and greatly affected the industry in current financial results and collective preparation efforts.

The legendary status and huge success of famous casino centers like Monte Carlo, Las Vegas, or Macao have inspired locals and Goa authorities to allow old-fashioned gambling operations for the most part. Naturally, these have paid off and brought economic development opportunities to the State. However, it is time for the local Government to look ahead and try to attract different player profiles, scope outside markets, and reach out to virtual gambling communities.

Psycho-social research we repeatedly quoted above has shown that legal gambling has a market-shaping appeal, much more than gambling in illegal settings might ever do. The growth of legal online/offshore casinos has established economic dimensions which were simply not there a decade ago.

Most recently, Meghalaya became only the fourth State to regulate gambling under a license-based regime. However, Nagaland is not actively exploiting its regulatory regime, and the states which benefit the most are currently only two – Goa and Sikkim. As per the recent ordinance, the license-based regime would be applicable for both ‘games of skills’ and ‘games of chance,’ and licenses will only be granted to “Indian citizens or companies incorporated in India” (to be renewed every five years).

This definition leaves open the opportunity for almost any operator to gain the legal right to run an online gambling platform under Meghalaya jurisdiction (as suggested above for Goa).

Whether Meghalaya and its newly established Gaming Commission will be able to capitalize on this opportunity remains to be seen. However, they have the opportunity to copy good practices, implement automation and digitization standards, and run and monitor all gaming activities easily, both in and out of the State.

On the other hand, the well-trodden path of offshore casinos has appeared attractive to other States in the Union as soon as the Fall of 2020. The Andhra Pradesh government was reportedly exploring the possibility of licensing floating casinos within its territorial waters, off the coasts of its largest city, Visakhapatnam. Raising resources and creating local jobs the way Goa has done seems attractive enough to the AP authorities, who are said to have spoken to the Centre about it.

The State debt, insufficient revenues, and the possibility to link gambling to its tourist exposure (along the capital beaches) caused the AP Government to consider the move. It is said to explore lottery draws as well.

Quite interestingly – and not too long ago – Andhra Pradesh banned online gambling explicitly and became one of only three states to do so. Therefore, the State government is likely hoping to physically attract tourists to its new casinos without considering the fact that allowing one channel and cutting another will simply produce fewer taxes and spill-over economic growth while limiting other such opportunities.

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The GoM added that there will not be GST on the value of bets placed in each round of betting, including those placed with winnings in previous rounds.

The finance ministers in the eight-member GoM include Suresh Khanna (Uttar Pradesh), Kanubhai Patel (Gujarat), P Thiaga Rajan (Tamil Nadu), and T Harish Rao (Telangana).

Meanwhile, industry body the Internet and Mobile Association of India (IAMAI) has said that the highest GST rate of 28% is meant for things that are considered "sinful consumption", and equating games of skill with gambling, betting and wagering will be against the spirit of Supreme Court judgement.

The IAMAI has appealed to the government to maintain the status quo on the online games of skill industry at 18% as the imposition of a 28% tax on gross gaming revenue will lead to an increase of tax incidence to 55%.

(With PTI inputs)

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Goa Casino Culture– Escape to [Goa] & enjoy the casino, the legal way-Goa where the fun starts is the perfect gateway to enjoy the sun, sand, beer, and also the casino and that too legally

Goa is the smallest state of India, is one of the few states in the country where gambling is legal. Only three smaller states in India allow casinos, Goa, Daman (UT), and northeastern state Sikkim.

There are only two casinos in Sikkim called Casino Sikkim and Casino Mahjong and roughly 10 in Goa, of which six are land-based and four are floating casinos that operate on the Mandovi River

Goa is widely known as the entertainment destination of India and is popular in western countries and Russia in particular. The best Casinos in India are in Goa of course. So, the next time you are heading to Goa, do ensure to visit one of these Casinos.

Months around the year-end marks the start of the peak season of Goa and it continues until March. In case you want to enjoy the casino from the comfort of home tries out the popular betting in Asia, the rise of online casinos, one good example is the online games at M88 Asia.