Digital Payments: Government Keeps The Goodies Coming

A week after announcing cashbacks and discounts on digital payments, the government announced two new schemes aimed at further incentivising, non cash payments-Lucky Grahak Yojana and the Digi-dhan Vyapari Yojna.

Announcing the schemes, NITI Aayog, CEO, Amitabh Kant said online payments of Rs 50 to Rs 3,000 made using RuPay cards, the Unified Payment Interface (UPI), Aadhar Enabled Payment System (AEPS) and Unstructured Supplementary Service Data (USSD), will be eligible for the schemes.

Under the Lucky Grahak Yojna, the National Payments Corporation of India (NPCI), starting December 25, will announce the name of 15,000 winners every day, who will be eligible for cashback worth up to Rs 1,000 each. This scheme will go on till April 14, 2017. A weekly cashback of up to Rs 1 lakh for 7,000 ‘lucky’ users has also been announced.

Under the Digi-Dhan Vyapari Yojana, around 7,000 merchants will be eligible for a weekly cashback of Rs 50,000, Kant said.

Mega awards, in both the categories will be declared on April 14, 2017 he said. Under this mega award, consumers can win prizes worth Rs 1 crore, Rs 50 lakh and Rs 25 lakh, while merchants can win prizes worth Rs 50 lakh, Rs 25 lakh, and Rs 5 lakh.

Only government sponsored modes of payments have been included in the scheme though, leaving out the other popular modes of payment like Visa and Master Card, and e-wallets such as Paytm and MobiKwik. Kant said the reason for omitting these service providers was the cumbersome process of obtain transaction details from them.

The estimated cost for the schemes is expected to be Rs 340 crore. "Our focus is on the poor, middle class and merchants, who we want to push towards digital payments,” Kant added. He said the National Payments Corporation of India was going to conduct the whole programme.

On the issue of security for transactions via the internet, Kant said the government was putting in place measures such as audits to keep in check frauds.