Digital payment revolution in India and its global ambition

Six years ago, in April 2016, a product was launched by the National Payment Corporation of India (NPCI) called Unified Payment Interface (UPI). At that time, nobody had thought that this made in India product would bring a revolution in the fintech market in India. UPI recorded the highest single-month transaction in May 2022. According to data released by the NPCI, UPI processed more than Rs 10 lakh crore worth of transactions in May alone by processing nearly 6 billion payments.

Today, apps like Phonepe, Paytm, Google Pay, and others have become a crucial part of everyone's lives. But when UPI was launched initially, experts, including banks, were suspicious of its acceptance in a market like India. The reasons were less financial inclusiveness and low financial literacy. However, India has proved all experts wrong. Today it is considered a highly innovative product in the world's payment market. In 2019, Google wrote a letter to "FedNow"—an interbank real-time gross settlement service (RTGS)—detailing the successful example of UPI based digital payment and suggesting that they can learn from innovations like these.

The global ambition of UPI is also on the right track. UPI has gained acceptance in Singapore (March 2020), Bhutan (July 2021), UAE & Nepal (Feb 2022). On June 17, 2022, the National Payments Corporation of India (NPCI) announced that UPI and Rupay cards (Indian payment cards) will soon be accepted in France. NPCI has already signed an MOU with Lyra, a France-based payment service provider. According to sources, NPCI is also eyeing other Asian markets like Malasyia, Thailand, and Vietnam. Without a doubt, UPI has the potential to be the first made in India product to cause a stir in the payment market. This will give great confidence to the Indian government, which is trying very hard to project India as a manufacturing and innovative hub.

(Disclaimer: The views of the writer do not represent the views of WION or ZMCL. Nor does WION or ZMCL endorse the views of the writer.)

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