RBI will push payment systems innovations with soft touch regulations: Governor

The Reserve Bank will continue to promote innovations in payment systems with soft touch regulations within regulatory guardrails and expand the reach of UPI for more efficient crossborder payments Governor Sanjay Malhotra said on MondayIn his address at the Inauguration of Digital Payments Awareness Week 2025 here the governor said apart from the RBI the government and other important stakeholders like banks and payment system operators have also taken a number of initiatives to encourage the adoption of digital paymentsWhile these efforts have produced results as visible in the huge growth of digital payments there is still a lot more to be done Going forward we will work on three broad areas he saidThe areas are softtouch regulations to continue promoting innovation promote awareness generation and more efficient crossborder paymentsWe will continue to encourage innovation while promoting safety and security through soft touch regulations the RBI chief said and added that the central bank has adopted a softtouch approach to regulating the payments ecosystem and fintechsWith these regulations he said the RBI attempts to balance these divergent sets of expectationsOur approach has been to put in place regulatory guardrails within which all stakeholders are free to operateWhile mentioning that initiatives to encourage the adoption of digital payments have produced results Malhotra said there is still a lot more to be doneOn crossborder payments the governor said while in domestic payments the success of UPI has propelled India to a leadership position with a share of 485 per cent in global realtime payments by volume we will endeavour to make crossborder payments more efficientAs per a World Bank report it has been estimated that in 2024 India received remittances totalling approximately USD 130 billionWe need to address the challenges of high cost slow speed and insufficient access and transparency in cross border paymentsWe will continue to expand the reach of UPI bilaterally by linking UPI with fast payment systems of other countries Malhotra saidThe RBI will also explore the possibility of linking payment systems other than UPI to facilitate efficient crossborder paymentsWe will continue our engagement in a multilateral project called Project Nexus to enable instant crossborder retail payments he addedMalhotra further said though much progress has been made in the development spread and adoption of digital payments there is a lot of scope to further deepen and expand digital payments in the countryIn January 2025 more than 20 billion payments worth almost Rs 250 trillion were made in India through digital modes Digital payments have become the preferred mode of payment for many of usHowever surveys have shown that nearly 40 per cent of our adult population still do not use digital payments One of the main reasons for this is the lack of awareness or familiarity with using digital payments he saidThe 5th Digital Payments Awareness Week DPAW is being observed from March 10 to 16DPAW is an initiative to highlight the impact and importance of digital payments and to create awareness about the safe usage of digital payment productsUnder the mission Har Payment Digital the theme for the current year is India Pays DigitallyThis theme reflects Indias transformative journey toward a digitally empowered citizenry with the ubiquity and convenience of digital payments the RBI saidThis story has been sourced from a third party syndicated feed agencies Midday accepts no responsibility or liability for its dependability trustworthiness reliability and data of the text Midday managementmiddaycom reserves the sole right to alter delete or remove without notice the content in its absolute discretion for any reason whatsoever