Standing on north Goa’s Noah’s Ark jetty, one can see beautifully-lit ships at a distance. Their reflections dance on the shimmering Mandovi river. A 10-minute boat ride and we reach Deltin Royale, the luxurious five-storey cruise ship and also the biggest casino in Goa.

The poker and flush room on the first level has almost a score tables. The playlist switches from soft rock of the 1980s and 1990s to contemporary bands such as Maroon 5 and then back to some lounge music. People keep shuffling in and out — individuals, couples, groups. A set of young men from Gujarat has a mountain of chips piled before them. An American couple head for the bar in one corner of the room. One of the walls has a row of framed photographs of different hands holding, well, different hands — card hands, of course.

Every table has a stash of colourful cookie-sized chips — red, black, white, green. Standing at the head of one of the oval tables is a man in his mid-twenties wearing a black waistcoat over a shiny golden shirt. He is bending, shuffling a deck of cards in a prolonged fillip. He has a poker face, literally. He flips two cards at a time, face down, and they land right in front of each player — five of them are seated around the table. And thus, begins the first round of poker.

At the table are India’s top poker-heads — they are referred to as poker pros. Two of them — Kunal Patni and Nikita Luther — are part of the Poker Sports League (PSL), an IPL-style initiative. Patni mentors team Kings Hyderabad of PSL and Nikita Luther is the chief operating officer of PSL. She is also the only Indian woman to win the World Series of Poker tournament bracelet at Las Vegas. Aditya Agarwal of Team PokerStars, an online poker card room, is also playing.

The occasion is a masterclass conducted by the All India Gaming Federation (AIGF). Roland Landers is CEO of AIGF. It is clear from his impassioned speech that he is out to de-gamble the game. He says, “There is ambiguity whenever poker is mentioned. It is not just about gambling, it is a combination of skill, mathematics, decision-making and grit.”

Luther talks about how it is recognised by top universities — the United States’ Massachusetts Institute of Technology offers a course on poker — Poker Theory and Analytics — as does the Indian Institute of Management, Kozhikode. “It is supposed to teach you the technical aspects of calculus and game theory. And also how to apply these learnings and teachings to business and analytics.” Please note: the ambassadors of the game are chess champ Viswanathan Anand, batsman Chris Gayle and boxer Vijender Singh.

Luther continues her poker evangelism and says, “It is considered gambling because it is played with a deck of cards and there is money involved. For beginners, it is definitely gambling as you are betting money without prior knowledge. But the same way sportspeople practise for hours to become professionals, poker skills also develop over time. If you climb Mt Everest without knowledge or safety gear, you’re gambling your life, right? When you go with adequate training, then you are not. Playing poker is just like that. You have to develop the skill and not gamble with it.” Clearly there’s work to be done.

The point of the game might not be mindless pleasure, but surely people don’t start out with a burning ambition to be a poker player? At least not in the way one aspires to be a cricketer or a footballer.

Luther’s story is this. She always had an aptitude for numbers. She discovered poker during her college days. But she started playing tournaments three years ago. And what does it feel like to be a woman poker pro in the Indian scenario, where it is a male-dominated game? She says, “People assume a woman player would not be all that smart.” The excitement in Luther’s kohl-lined eyes rises. Clearly, she gets a kick busting that myth. “I feel very passionately about women’s representation in the game because poker is a sport that does not discriminate on the basis of gender or for that matter on the basis of age, religion, caste, or social status.”

Patni quit being a banker to pursue the sport. He points out how people are waking up to the skill element in poker only now.

But for all that has been said about poker stratagem being tied to this mathematical theory or that, fact is that not everyone who shines in the game, especially all those online versions coming out of the woodwork, has much to do with number crunching. Patni concedes that Lady Luck plays her hand, but doesn’t stop at that. “From the moment the cards are dealt, there is decision-making at every stage. Multiple thoughts go into it, in terms of the cards — how the opponent is behaving, what possible hand to play,” he says.

He talks about “tells” — poker parlance for tell-tale ways of a player. Does one seem nervous while playing a particular hand? Is one excited? A good player can see and understand. “It could be through your expressions or even how you are breathing,” he tells us.

Where social poker differs from the full-time sport is in the area of player training. “You need to be mentally and physically fit,” says Aditya Agarwal. Sitting for long hours at the poker table or working on your concentration, one needs to be prepared in every way. Like chess? Is that the Anand connection? Agarwal differentiates between poker and chess. He calls poker “a partial information game”. “When we play chess, all the information is right in front of us. But in poker you do not know the cards that will be dealt to you. In poker, the best player does not always win.”

Nicknames of poker hands

• Ace + 9: Rounders Hand — after a movie with the same name
• Ace + 8: Dead Man’s Hand because 19th century American gunfighter Wild Bill Hickok was holding those cards when he was shot dead
• King + 9: Canine because, you know, K-nine
• Ace + 5: High Five, as an ace is high up in hierarchy in any deck
• Ace + King: Anna Kournikova — because of her initials; also looks good but never wins