Did digital transactions jump 23 times as Niti Aayog claimed?

RBI data shows that digital transactions did not even double in the period as claimed by Niti Aayog

"Volume of all digital transactions increased by about 23 times with 63,80,000 digital transactions for a value of Rs 2,425 crore in March 2017, compared to 2,80,000 digital transactions worth Rs 101 crore till November 2016," Niti Aayog said in a statement on April 14. 

Did Niti Aayog overstate the gains made?

Data from RBI give a lie to Niti Aayog’s assertion. Times of India reported yesterday that data from RBI did not agree with what Niti Aayog claimed. 

Niti Aayog is the government’s policy think-tank had released a statement highlighting the growth in digital transactions in India after demonetisation. Promotion of a cashless India has been one of the stated goals of demonetisation with Niti Aayog even running an award scheme to popularise digital payments.

Times of India compared Niti Aayog’s claims with data from RBI and found that digital transactions - volume and values - have not even doubled when October, 2016 figures are compared with March, 2017 figures. Niti Aayog had claimed they had grown by 23 times.

Anna Roy, adviser (DAMD), Niti Aayog, who was in charge of preparing the statement, told ToI that the numbers were provided by National Payments Corporation of India. When it was pointed out to her that the numbers given by NPCI were too high while data showed that the growth was much lower, she said, “I agree with you”.

Amitabh Kant, CEO of Niti Aayog told ToI that the numbers were “reconciled and double checked by our (Niti Aayog’s) IT department) while another member of his team said that this could have been a “typographical error”

NPCI informed ToI that the numbers it had shared were for UPI payments only and were correct. NPCI developed a mobile app Bharat Interface for Money (BHIM) that uses UPI to help people make financial transactions.  The app was launched in December, 2016.

RBI’s provisional data shows that 890.1 million transactions took place in March. The highest number was reached in December, 2016 when a total of 957.5 million transactions were completed.