Ravi Shankar Prasad urges public and private banks to promote digital payments

In line with the priority of Government of India to promote Digital Payment transactions, the Ministry of Electronics and IT is taking a number of initiatives not only to offer better products in terms of technology and user friendliness but also to inform, educate and enable citizens in the country on digital transactions.

In this context, Shri Ravi Shankar Prasad, Hon'ble Minister of Electronics and IT and Law & Justice, Govt of India met with senior representatives of the public and private sector banks and other key departments.

The meeting was attended by Smt. Aruna Sundarajan – Secretary, Ministry of Electronics and IT and representatives from RBI, NPCI, SBI, Department of Financial Services, CERT-In and other senior officials.

The Honourable Minister remarked that digital payments need to be made convenient and flawless. Banks have a very important role to play in Digital India and Digi DhanAbhiyan.

He urged the banks to incentivise digital payments and transactions to bring more people into the fold of digital banking. He remarked that to address concerns of cyber security, the department will soon conduct security drill both for the banks and NPCI.He urged the banks to adopt villages and promote digital inclusion and awareness about digital payments with them. He also requested that villageswith majority tribal population be prioritised by banks for creating awareness on digital payments and transactions. This would be an opportunity for banks to become change agents to spread awareness about Digital India

He urged the banks to create a uniform branding for promoting digital payments. Such uniform branding would help create awareness amongst the general public on availability of digital transactions with merchants.

He recommended that the banks should identify large mandisto encourage adoption of digital transactions. The meeting also deliberated various issues relating to Technology and Security of UPI, USSD, RuPay and Aadhar Enabled Payment Systems.

MeitY emphasised the need for utmost rigour in ensuring and complying with RBI guidelines with the current focus on increased use of digital payment transactions.

It was informed that NPCI will soon launch a redesigned USSD platform and a common app for UPI for enabling digital transactions, as well as addressing inter-operability issues.

Secretary MeitY, Smt. Aruna Sundarajan urged banks to work towards making USSD a preferable and convenient mode of digital payments, in light of the fact that majority of Jan-Dhan account holders would directly benefit from it.

She asserted that banks should set up an easy to access helpline dedicated for resolution of issues pertaining to digital payment transactions. Banks should also collaborate with the efforts that are being undertaken by the Common Service Centers as part of their outreach campaign on Digital Payments.

The Ministry of Electronics and IT is fully committed to promote the Digital Payment ecosystem in the country through technology, leadership by creating awareness and enablement programme like Digi DhanAbhiyan and initiatives like DigiShala and www.cashlessindia.gov.in