Commerce Ministry pushes cashless transactions, ATMs to pull crowds to global Trade Fair

Ministry ups efforts after demonetisation expected to take a toll on footfalls and sales

With the amount of physical cash left with people running dangerously low, the Commerce Ministry has stepped up its efforts to draw more visitors to the India International Trade Fair, opening to the public on Saturday.

These include substantially increasing the number of ATMs on site, providing more swipe machines to ticket counters and tying up with digital wallet companies like Paytm and Freecharge to allow cashless transactions.

Announced by Prime Minister Narendra Modi on 8 November, the move to demonetize currency notes of Rs.500 and Rs.1000 value marked a 9th day on Thursday with queues outside banks and ATMs showing no signs of reducing. With the limit for swapping notes at banks being reduced from Rs 4,500 to Rs 2,000 for each person from Friday, the situation is set to become worse.

With cash being scarce, footfalls in the event are expected to drop with sales being hit at the 36th edition of the global trade and exhibition event held annually. "Our projections suggested that fewer people might turn up owing to the current situation", an official from India Trade Promotion Organisation, the body under the Ministry in charge of organising the event, said.

A proposal to hike ticket prices have also been shelved with an eye to this, he added under conditions of anonymity. The price of tickets for general visitors has been kept at Rs 60 on weekdays for adults and Rs 120 on weekends, which can be bought online.

Based on the theme of Digital India, the fair has kicked off with 7000 participants in an exhibition area of more than 1 lakh square metre. This year, the partner country is South Korea and country in focus is Belarus.

The fair saw four days of business to business interactions and events from 14th to 17th November. During this period, business tickets cost Rs.500 which kept away smaller traders, another official said.

Apart from providing ticket booths with a sufficient number of swipe machines (POS), the Ministry has also promised to provide exhibitors with the machines through a tie-up with State Bank of India (SBI) and Axis Bank. This will be supplanted by a higher number of ATM machines being installed, up from 2 last year to 14 this time.

One or more mobile ATMs are also expected to be set up. However, visitors have complained of the machines running on empty, same as others across the city.

For small artisans and exhibitors, SBI has been tied up to open bank accounts, if needed, on site.

Apart from exhibition stalls being set up by various Ministries, state governments of Punjab, Tamil Nadu, West Bengal, Bihar, Odisha, among others are expected to be major crowd pullers with a significant amount of buying and selling.

READ OUR FULL COVERAGE ON THE MODI GOVT'S DEMONETISATION MOVE