Digital payments have grown more than 50% over the last 3 Financial Years

Digital payments have grown more than 50% over the last 3 Financial Years The Digital India Program, according to the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MeitY), has had a major and positive impact on the lives of ordinary citizens in the country. Dr Bhagwat Kisanrao Karad, Union Minister of State for Finance, mentioned this in a written response to a question in the Lok Sabha today. According to the Minister, as a result of the effort, the number of digital payments has increased in volume over the last three financial years (FY), as shown below: The Minister noted that ANNEXURE has brief descriptions of significant Digital India initiatives, among other things. According to the Minister, Scheduled Commercial Banks have been given the discretion to determine service charges for various sorts of services offered by them, as informed by the Reserve Bank of India (RBI), in line of extant directives, with effect from September 7, 1999. Banks have been instructed to ensure that service costs are reasonable and in accordance with the typical cost of delivering these services when setting service charges. They have also been advised to identify basic services and the principles to be adopted/followed by them in order to ensure reasonableness in determining such charges, as well as to take steps to ensure that customers are made aware of service charges upfront and that changes in service charges are implemented only with prior notice to customers. The Minister went on to say that the foregoing directives are summarised in paragraph 6 of the Master Circular on 'Customer Service in Banks,' which was released on July 1, 2015, and is available on the RBI website www.rbi.org.in. In addition, the RBI issued circular DPSS.CO.PD No. 1633 / 02.14.003 / 2017-18 on December 06, 2017, advising banks, among other things, to ensure that merchants onboarded by them do not pass on MDR charges to customers while receiving debit card payments. According to the Minister, any charge, including the Merchant Discount Rate (MDR), will not be applicable on or after 01.01.2020 on payments made through prescribed electronic modes, such as RuPay Debit card, BHIM-UPI, and BHIM-UPI QR Code, as per Department of Revenue Circular 32 of 2019 dated 30.12.2019.