Govt taking initiatives to expand UPI's global reach: MoS Chaudhary in RS

Minister of State for Finance Pankaj Chaudhary on Tuesday said the government and RBI have been taking various initiatives for expanding the global reach of UPI, which is currently available in seven nations.

RBI's Payments Vision Document 2025 has also outlined expanding the global outreach of UPI and RuPay cards as one of the key objectives under the internationalisation pillar, he said in a written reply in the Rajya Sabha.

"The government along with RBI has been taking various initiatives from time to time for expanding the global outreach of UPI. RBI has been collaborating with various relevant stakeholders (central banks of various countries, Bank of International Settlements, World Bank and other institutions) for expanding the outreach of UPI," he said.

With these concerted efforts, he said, UPI is live in seven countries--Bhutan, Singapore, the UAE, France, Mauritius, Sri Lanka and Nepal.

Replying to another question, Chaudhary said, the government, Reserve Bank of India (RBI) and National Payments Corporation of India (NPCI) have been taking various initiatives from time to time to promote RuPay cards including increasing its penetration in Tier-II and Tier-III cities.

RBI has permitted the linking of RuPay credit cards with Unified Payments Interface (UPI), he said, adding, this integration is aimed at enhancing the reach and usage of RuPay credit cards by providing customers with more convenient avenues to make payments.

As per available data, he said, RuPay is amongst the top three payment service providers and is the fastest growing credit card network in the country. More than 50 per cent of the cards issued in June 2024 were RuPay credit cards.

In terms of number of transactions, 31.7 per cent transactions were processed on RuPay credit cards in June.