Digital payments have still a long way to go, says RBI

While India ranks as a ‘leader’ in regulation of costs of payments systems, number of ATMs deployed and availability of alternate payment systems, it is categorised as ‘weak’ when it comes to the share of cheque volume relative to all payment instruments, share of card payments, and digital payment of utility bills, according to the Reserve Bank of India’s report on Benchmarking India’s Payment Systems.

The benchmarking was undertaken by selecting a mix of 21 countries (including advanced economy countries, Asian economies and BRICS (Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa) nations. It has been done over a range of 21 areas and 41 indicators. Payment systems have been rated on the basis of categories — “leader”: