RBI deepens digital pay infra, launches UPI for 400 mn feature phone users
- IBEF
- March 9, 2022
The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) unveiled a Unified Payments Interface (UPI) for feature phone users in order to increase the country's acceptance of digital payments. This would enable greater democratisation of UPI in the country and make digital payments more inclusive by allowing people from lower socioeconomic strata to participate. There are over 400 million feature phones in the country.
“We believe the innovative functionalities offered on feature phones will provide a push to UPI in various geographies across the country and will transform the way payments are perceived”, said Mr Biswamohan Mahapatra, Chairman, National Payments Corporation of India (NPCI), the umbrella organisation for retail digital payments in the country. Enabling UPI for feature phone users will also assist NPCI in meeting its goal of processing 1 billion transactions per day. It will also help the RBI achieve its goal of reducing the use of cash. Mr. Dilip Asbe, NPCI CEO said that, In the next 3–5 years, NPCI wants to see 1 billion transactions per day on the UPI platform. "It is critical that we pursue the three "zero" approaches – zero-touch (contactless), zero time (it must be faster than cash), and zero expense to the client – to achieve this milestone in the next 3-5 years.
Disclaimer: This information has been collected through secondary research and IBEF is not responsible for any errors in the same.
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