Why was Free Fire banned in India? reason revealed

Most blocked apps are Chinese or clones of previously banned apps

14 de February de 2022 Ronny Rolim

Garena Free Fire , one of the most famous Battle Royale mobile games, has been officially banned by the government of India along with 53 other apps. The shocking news crushed the hopes of fans who had been waiting for the game to return to Google Play and the App Store after its initial removal.

On Saturday, February 12th, Free Fire was removed from the Android and iOS app stores , while many users started reporting login issues. Allegedly, many internet operators stopped working for the game, and many speculated that the inevitable decision would happen soon.

The reason for the banning of Garena Free Fire in India revealed

Free Fire banned from India — The game was removed from both app stores on February 12 (Image via Garena)

In India, the eSports scene was finally catching up and seeing an uptick due to the impressive popularity of Free Fire . The ban proved to be an unfortunate occurrence for the Indian gaming scene once again. The move to ban Garena's shooting game was unpredictable and quite sudden.

The scale and amount of this wave of bans is similar to what happened during the infamous TikTok and PUBG Mobile bans . The reasons that India's Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology cited for blocking these apps were related to the country's security, defense and sovereignty .

Free Fire was the #1 Battle Royale mobile game in India in downloads and revenue in 2021, so this is a huge blow.

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So the reason behind the recent ban of 54 apps in India must be similar. However, most blocked apps are Chinese or clones of previously banned apps. So blocking the popular Battle Royale seems a bit difficult considering Garena is a Singaporean company .

Free Fire banned in India — Free Fire was officially banned from India on February 14 — Photo: Reproduction

From now on, fans are waiting for an official statement from Garena's side, as he has kept quiet amid all the recent developments. Indian social media handles for the game also did not update users on the situation.

The only positive aspect of this saga is the availability of the Free Fire MAX variant, which is still operational in India. Fans can download it from the Google Play Store right now as there is no news about its ban in India.