DFS Secretary urges fintechs to drive offline payments, boost inclusion

DFS Secretary M Nagaraju on Monday urged fintechs to focus on driving offline payment solutions to enhance financial inclusions.

"I would like to request fintechs to focus their attention on payment solutions for offline payment," Nagaraju said at the CII Summit on Financial Inclusion and FinTech.

He highlighted that financial inclusion is increasingly recognised as a major factor in economic growth and poverty alleviation on a global scale.

He pointed out that seven of the 17 United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (UN SDGs) are directly connected to financial inclusion. This suggests the importance of improving access to financial services for the unbanked and under-served populations, he said.

To illustrate progress made in India, he recalled data from before 2014, when only about 35 per cent of adults in India had access to a bank account, as estimated by the Global Findex Database.

In response to this situation, the Pradhan Mantri Jan Dhan Yojana (PMJDY) was launched in 2014 to improve financial access. Now, 99 per cent of adults in India have bank accounts. This scheme enabled lakhs of Indians to open bank accounts and integrate into the formal financial system, he added.