Betting big on the rapidly growing Indian FinTech sector, the Union finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman has promised all possible support to the sector to foster the growth of digital payments in the country.
Sitharaman while speaking at the Global FinTech Fest said that India is among the fastest adopters of Fintech. The Global FinTech Fest has been organised by the Internet and Mobile Association of India (IAMAI), along with its sister organisations Fintech Convergence Council (FCC), Payments Council of India (PCI), and National Payments Corporation of India (NPCI).
“The Indian government and the Prime Minister's interest in pushing digital payments is showing results, both from the user and the government there is energetic participation in growing digital,” the finance minister said.
According to the minister, the FinTech adoption in India is 87% as compared to the global average of 64%. “India is the prime destination for digital payments, we are very happy to further support and strengthen UPI,” Sitharaman said. “Every section of the Indian population is benefiting with the adoption of technology.”
According to Sitharaman, in 2019 India processed payments worth Rs 2 lakh crore which doubled to Rs 4 lakh crore in 2020. In 2021, from January to August India processed Rs 6 lakh crore worth of transactions across 355 individual transactions.
“Digitisation has enabled the government to put money directly into the account of the direct benefit transfer beneficiaries, that money has come as a big relief in the lockdown,” she said adding, “the payment systems have become matured and well-layered and has adopted to several schemes that the government wanted to undertake.”
FM stressed data privacy and said that safeguard client data was the backbone of bringing trust in digital payments.
