Patrick Holdt (grassmove5)
Matka gambling or satta is really a form of betting and lottery which originally involved betting on the opening and closing rates of cotton transmitted from the New York Cotton Exchange to the Bombay Cotton Exchange. It hails from before the era of Indian independence when it was referred to as Ankada Jugar ("figures gambling"). In the 1960s, the machine was replaced with different ways of generating random numbers, including pulling slips from the large earthenware pot known as a matka, or coping with playing cards.
In 1961, the New York Cotton Exchange stopped the practice, which caused the punters to watch out for alternative ways to keep carefully the matka business alive. A Sindhi migrant from Karachi, Pakistan, Ratan Khatri introduced the idea of declaring opening and closing rates of imaginary products and handmade cards. Numbers will be written on pieces of paper and placed into a matka, a large earthen pitcher. One person would then draw a chit and declare the winning numbers. Over time, the practice changed, so that three numbers were drawn from a pack of playing cards, however the name "matka" was kept.[2]
In 1962, Kalyanji Bhagat started the Worli matka. Ratan Khatri then introduced the New Worli matka in 1964, with slight modifications to the rules of the overall game with odds which were more favourable to the general public. Kalyanji Bhagat's matka ran each day of the week, whereas Ratan Khatri's matka ran only five days weekly, from Monday to Friday and later since it gained immense popularity and became synonymous with his name, it begun to be called Main Ratan matka. [3]
The decades of 1980s and 1990s saw the matka business reach its peak. Betting volumes in excess of Rs. 500 crore will be laid every month. The Mumbai Police?s massive crackdown on the matka dens forced dealers to shift their hiedouts to the city?s outskirts. Many of them moved to Gujarat, Rajasthan along with other states. With no major way to obtain betting in the town, many punters were attracted to other forms of gambling such as online and zhatpat lotteries. Meanwhile, some rich punters began to explore betting on cricket matches.[4]
In 1995 there were more than 2,000 big and medium-time bookies in the town and neighboring towns, but since then the numbers have declined substantially to less than 300. During the 2000s, the average monthly turnover has remained around Rs. 100 crore.[2] The present day matka business is centered around Maharashtra.[citation needed]
How to play To play, a gambler chooses three numbers between 0 and 9. The three chosen numbers are added together and the next digit of the resulting number is noted down alongside the initial three chosen numbers. This leaves the gambler with four numbers, that point they may bet on the many likelihoods of the numbers or number sequences appearing or being chosen from the pot.[5]
Matka King The leader of a matka gambling syndicate is named a "Matka King".
Kalyanji Bhagat Kalyanji Bhagat was created a farmer in the village of Ratadia, Games Wala in Kutch, Gujarat. Kalyanji's family name was Gala and the name Bhagat, a modification of bhakt, was a title directed at their family by the King of Kutch because of their religiousness.
Khatri's matka syndicate started in the bustling business area of Dhanji Street in Mumbadevi where idlers used to wager on the daily trickle of the fluctuating cotton rates from the brand new York market. Gradually, it became a big gambling hub because the quantum of bets and betters increased. Due to a row over an absolute number plus the NY market's five-day week schedule, compulsive betters began looking for alternatives. In line with the requests of his friends, Khatri started his own syndicate and started drawing three cards to choose the day's number. Khatri used to draw three cards, twice daily at 9.00pm (the 'open') and at nighttime (t
