When Nishant Sharma won the inaugural Asian Poker Tour Championship Main Event last year for over one million dollars, one might have reasonably expected a poker boom to follow in his native India.
But since that memorable moment in Taiwan, the poker landscape in India has been affected by significant legal issues. Online poker has been shut down, and the trickledown effect means the live scene has suffered too.
“We don't have any more online poker over in India,” explains Kunal Patni (pictured above), a seasoned live tournament pro with more than $2.3M in live tournament earnings. “And that means there are no more live tournaments in India, because they were run by all the poker sites. So there are hardly any tournaments to play in India.”
Patni is a fixture in India’s all-time top 10, just a few spots below Sharma and, like many Indian pros, has had to adjust his tournament schedule with an increased focus on events overseas. Although with live poker undergoing such a period of growth in Asia, he’s not exactly complaining.
There exists a wealth of opportunities on the continent for players from all over but, as Patni makes clear, only for those Indians who can afford to travel.
“Most of the Indian players were making money on Indian sites so they had enough money to travel to play, but because online poker is no longer there, not too many people are making that much money.
“So live poker has reduced for a few players, but the ones who are playing poker for a living there, they've been traveling.”
The Asian Main Event
Patni’s name is on that list.
In the past two years alone he’s racked up results in Vietnam, Cambodia, Korea and The Philippines, not to mention successful tournaments in Las Vegas: he final-tabled the $3K NLH bracelet event at the 2025 WSOP a week after winning a $1.6K Monster Bounty event at The Venetian.
He also final-tabled the hyper-turbo high roller at last year’s APT Championship (APTC), and is adamant that — like the WSOP — the season-ending poker festival in Taipei is now one opportunity he’s not prepared to pass up.
As in 2025, this year’s APTC Main Event will be a $10K freezeout with a prizepool of $5M guaranteed.
“I've been going to the WSOP for the last 11 years, and now the APT Championship is one-stop that we can't miss, for sure.
“I love the freezeout for the Main Event because there has to be certain events which take away the edge from the regs who can fire multiple bullets. It makes it a level playing field, just like the WSOP Main Event.
“I remember some of the regs who came and they were, like, ‘They should allow one re-entry or something like that’. I said, ‘You never complain about that when you play the WSOP, so why should you allow that in the Asian Main Event?’”
The secret is out
Today is the first Monday of APT Jeju, and while there will be no major honors being awarded before things wrap for the day, there is plenty of action going on at the tables.
Day 1b of the $2K Main Event is underway in one section of the LES A Casino in Jeju, while close by there are some two dozen players in the first day of the $27K Superstar Challenge. Elsewhere there is the Big O, the Women’s Heads-Up tourney, fixed-limit triple draw mix and much more.
Patni, for now, is focused on the $3.3K Ultra Stack High Roller, a mainstay of the APT schedule which has so far attracted 161 entries to this particular area of the casino.
He says his first table of the day was all regs, but his new table has been “very fun — I’ve seen some crazy stuff happening”.
And while the expected boom in Indian players may not have been realized in the way some may have expected, Patni has noticed a boost in players from Europe and the USA.
“When I traveled to Vegas this year, we saw the advertisement for the APT on all the screens, and at nearly every table there was somebody who asked me about the APT, and ‘is it worth coming?’
“I've been telling everyone, this is something that you cannot miss. I know it's a bit of a travel from there, but it's something which you should definitely come for. We saw the numbers last year in the freezeout. They crushed the [$5M] guarantee, and I'm sure this year the numbers will be even bigger.
“It's a great time to be a poker player in Asia, and the number of European regs we see now is already significantly higher than what we saw last year, and it's just going to continue.”
I have to ask Patni: as a professional player, is that a good thing? His answer comes with a wry smile.
“To be honest, I would rather not have them coming here! We would like to keep it a little bit of a secret, because Asian tournaments are still soft compared to a lot of other places.”
How are the Euros and US players faring so far in these ‘softer’ fields?
Including side events, there have now been 28 tournaments completed at APT Jeju 2026. Here’s how the winners break down by nationality, so far:
Asia:
- China: 14
- Japan: 5
- Hong Kong: 3
- Thailand: 2
- Malaysia: 2
- Taiwan: 1
Europe:
- United Kingdom: 1
ROW:
- 0
Wherever in the world you’re from, if you want to try your luck in Asia’s booming live poker scene there’s a seat open.
Come and represent.
APT Jeju runs at the LES A Casino in Jeju Shinhwa World until October 7.
The APT Championship takes place November 13-29 at Red Space, Taipei City, Taiwan.
Additional images courtesy of the WSOP/APT.
