CS:GO: FACEIT Bans Former Velocity Gamers, Accused Get 2 Years Punishment 

In a shocking news, four CS:GO professional players from an Indian esports organization named Velocity Gaming were got banned from a popular third-party matchmaking website called FACEIT. The news came as a huge blow for the entire community. The four players have been well-known and influential names in the esports scene for a long time, and nobody could even guess something like this. 

Hacking in CS:GO is an old practice for some players who wish to get unfair advantage in the game. However, it’s a huge thing when a professional player does the same. It is no secret that Valve’s anti-cheat software is not strong enough to detect these hacks, thus giving players an easy way of getting an unfair advantage.

Earlier, some pro players have been caught and punished multiple times for cheating in between tournaments or even in their live streams. However, the sad part is that some are still cheating and going unnoticed.

VLT CS:GO players getting banned on FACEIT

Its been a long time since the Indian CS:GO community has dealt with a hacker like Forsaken. The hacker gained notoriety after he used cheating software in a match of eXTREMESLAND ZOWIE Asia CS:GO 2018. The incident was later discovered by the tournament admins. This led Optic India to disband immediately. Thankfully, this time around it’s not as big as that one, however it has created anger and disappointment in the community considering VLT’s popularity in the space.

The Four players from VLT Gaming in contention are Bodhisattwa “The_Guru” Pandey, Nairit “L0sttt_” Bannerjee, Tamojit “Logan0fff-” Ghosal, and Muhammad “Syahhftw” Shyarul Daneal Bin Arif. While these gour were immediately banned from FACEIT, their teammates, Dipayan “MaChOleleR” Das and Keven “KevinR” Ross Russel haven’t met the same fate. 

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L0stt_ and Logan0fff-  have been banned for only two years with the ban ending on August 25, 2025. On the other hand, The_Guru and Syahhftw- have received a indefinite prohibition. Notably these players are still allowed to play on the official servers of the game. This is because FACEIT uses a stronger anti-cheat, which is way superior to Valve’s anti-cheat.

Bodhisattwa “The_Guru” Pandey, in a Facebook comment claims that it is a false ban. He further stated that the four have already approached the FACEIT authorities regarding this issue. According to Pandey they are currently awaiting their verdict. 

He further added that they were playing from a cafe at the time of the incident, not their PC. Thus there could be possibilities that a third person used some hacking software since it is a  public cafe.

VLT had previously signed four Indian and two international pro CS:GO esports players on July 4, 2023. This roster was set to participate in the Skyesports Masters 2023. However, their performance wasn’t up to the mark. This led to their below average results in the Skyesports Masters Regular season, and eventually failed to qualify for the main event. 

Following the failure, Velocity Gaming released their lineup on August 18. VLT owner Manoj “Sentinel” Kasyap reportedly defended the players saying, “Team played under Sky admins supervision and we also had 1 guy from VLT watching them play the games . We also had an anti-cheat installed on all PCsand no other program on them.”

The owner was confident that their ex-players would never pursue any unfair means. Similarly, other players from the community are hoping that the professional players get unbanned as soon as possible and get back on the scene. However, if at all the ban is legit, this might just be  another downfall of the Indian CS:GO scene this year.