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Card games in India

This page is part of the National and Regional Card Games Index of the Card Games Web Site.

There are probably many card games played in India. Games played with the standard pack include:

• Twenty-nine is a point-trick game descended from the jass group, played by 4 people with a 32 card pack.
• Two games similar to 29 are played in Kerala: Twenty-eight using the same 32 card pack, and Fifty-six, using a double pack of 2x24 cards.
• Literature, a sophisticated game of the Quartet family, is played in Tamil Nadu and Kerala.
• Sip - fishing game related to Casino. Unfortunately I have not managed to find the details of the rules, and the fragements of description that I have are inconsistent, suggesting that there are several versions of the game.
• A version of Rummy in which each player is dealt 13 cards, and a player must make at least two runs, one of them without wild cards, in order to go out.
• Teen Pathi (Three Cards) - a gambling game similar to the British game Three Card Brag.

There are also the traditional circular Ganjifa cards, which are still used in a few places. With these cards there are the plain-trick games Hamrang and Ekrang, and the gambling game Naqsh, which is also played with standard cards.

The World Casino Directory includes a listing of Casinos in India.