India, March 19 -- The Centre is set to notify the final rules under the Promotion and Regulation of Online Gaming (PROG) Act, 2025, with key provisions eased to make the framework more industry-friendly, two officials in the IT ministry said.

A significant change from the October draft is that registration for online social games will be completely voluntary. The industry had flagged ambiguity in the draft rules, with rule 4(2) suggesting that such games would need to register with the Online Gaming Authority of India to operate legally, while rule 4(3) stated that online social games may be offered without registration.

"Registration has now been made fully voluntary for online social games," one of the officials said. The move follow...