RBI Governor Shaktikanta Das, while announcing the monetary policy statement, revealed the central bank’s plans for UPI which Das said was acknowledged in G20 as the `most efficient and advanced payment system in the world.’
On cross border use of UPI Das said that it is already in use in Singapore, while with UAE, the integration will be completed in a few months. ” Discussions are also underway with a few other countries for the linkage of payment systems, including some advanced economies that have shown a keen interest in connecting to UPI,” said Das. Responding to a query, RBI deputy governor T Rabi Sankar said that Japan has shown inteterest in integrating with UPI systems and talks are on with the international arm of the National Payments Corporation of India.
The conversational payment feature is aimed at expanding digital accessibility across the nation by catering to both smartphones and feature phones-based UPI channels. The introduction of this feature in Hindi and English, followed by its availability in more Indian languages, underscores the RBI’s commitment to inclusivity, the governor said.
UPI-lite was introduced as an on-device wallet in September last year year and reduced both the loan on the IT systems and transaction failures. The governor said that there are over ten million transactions each month. “To promote the use of UPI-Lite, it is proposed to facilitate offline transactions using Near Field Communication (NFC) technology. This feature will not only enable retail digital payments in situations where internet/telecom connectivity is weak or unavailable, it will also ensure speed, with minimal transaction declines,” the RBI said.
RBI has also hiked the earlier limit of Rs 200 per transaction for UPI Lite and the NCMC (national common mobility cards). These instruments are enabled for transactions without second-factor authentication (PIN or OTP). “To encourage wider adoption of this mode of payments and bring in more use cases into this mode, it is now proposed to increase the per transaction limit to Rs 500. The overall limit is, however, retained at Rs 2000 to contain the risks associated with relaxation of two-factor authentication,” RBI said.
The central bank has also decided to make available as a public tech platform, the digital stack that was used by banks for automating sanction of low-value farm loans under kisan credit card. With this lenders will be able to automate sanction and disbursement of other loans.
