Introduction India’s real-time digital payments architecture, spearheaded by the Unified Payments Interface, has achieved unprecedented operational scale, handling over 750 million daily transactions with a strategic target of exceeding one billion daily transactions. However, this explosive growth in transaction volume has coincided with an increasingly sophisticated landscape of financial cybercrime, forcing regulatory authorities and infrastructure…
Introduction India’s card payments ecosystem has recently seen two fee-related issues come to a head in quick succession. On one hand, the National Payments Corporation of India has issued detailed FAQs clarifying the Merchant Discount Rate, the fee a merchant pays for accepting a digital payment, applicable to UPI transactions, providing much-needed certainty to industry…
Introduction The National Payments Corporation of India (“NPCI”) launched Agentic Orchestration & Messaging (“AtOM”), an open-source platform designed to manage the full lifecycle of a specification change across India’s payments ecosystem. AtOM takes a change from an initial idea through research, design documents and schemas, out to partner banks and payment service providers over an…
Introduction The Unified Payments Interface (“UPI”) has transformed India’s digital payments ecosystem by enabling instant payments without a direct transaction charge for consumers and merchants. However, its unprecedented growth has raised a fundamental question: if UPI transactions remain free for users, who should ultimately bear the cost of maintaining the infrastructure? The question has gained…
Introduction On 13 May 2026, RBI introduced a new framework for facilitating outward remittances through non-bank entities in partnership with Authorised Dealer (AD) Category-I banks. The significant change was simple: non-bank entities no longer need prior RBI approval for such tie-ups. Instead, banks can enter into these arrangements within a prescribed regulatory framework. This could…
Introduction India’s digital payments revolution is often defined by one word, UPI. The Unified Payments Interface has transformed the manner in which money moves, making transactions instant, interoperable and accessible. However, the next phase of India’s digital financial journey may not be about making payments faster. It may be about making financial opportunity easier to…
Introduction The rapid expansion of digital payments, online banking and fintech platforms has transformed India’s financial ecosystem. However, the same infrastructure has also enabled cyber fraudsters to transfer illicit funds rapidly across multiple bank accounts and payment channels. In response, law-enforcement authorities and financial institutions increasingly rely upon account freezes, debit restrictions and lien markings…
Introduction Over the past three years, the Karnataka High Court has become the principal forum for testing how far the Union Government’s power to control online content in India actually extends. X Corp (formerly Twitter) has twice challenged the Government’s takedown machinery before the Court, first over blocking orders issued under Section 69A of the…
Introduction UPI, mobile banking, digital wallets and prepaid payment instruments have made moving money faster and easier than ever. Unfortunately, the same infrastructure that makes a legitimate payment instant also lets a fraudster move stolen funds through several accounts before anyone notices. A mule account is a bank account used to receive, hold or pass…
Introduction Every digital fraud alert a bank sends out today tells only part of the story. A fraudster caught moving money through one bank’s mule account has often already opened five more, spread across other banks, wallets and payment apps, long before any single institution connects the dots. India’s fraud detection systems have largely been…
Introduction The Reserve Bank of India (“RBI”) published the Digital Payments E-Mandate Framework 2026 (“Direction”) on April 21, 2026, in accordance with its legal authority under the Payment and Settlement Systems Act, 2007 (“The Act”). The Direction unifies various circulars and guidance pertaining to recurrent digital transactions into a single, cohesive document. The Directions are…
Introduction Lenders assessed creditworthiness using traditional indicators such as repayment history, income, and existing loans, with Credit Information Companies like CIBIL converting these into a credit score. AI-driven credit scoring is transforming this approach by analysing alternative data, including mobile usage, utility bill payments, digital transactions, app behaviour, and device patterns, to assess borrowers with…
Introduction Spanning from credit decisions, fraud detection, customer service, to risk management, banks and other regulated entities in India have gradually shifted their reliance on spreadsheet-based calculators to high-tech AI and machine learning systems. This transition has brought tangible efficiencies but also a new class of risk not covered by traditional banking supervision. To address…
Introduction For years, India’s fintech ecosystem have seen a familiar script unfold. A customer success executive with database access exports a CSV with thousands of user profile names, PAN numbers, bank account details, loan histories. The internal security team logs the anomaly. HR silently suspends the employee. Legal counsel is in the loop. Then the…
Introduction The global fintech landscape is witnessing a defining contest between privately issued stablecoins and government-backed digital currencies. Rather than following international trends, India has adopted a cautious regulatory approach centred on the Digital Rupee and long-term financial stability. The largest policy challenge of the moment is to decide on whether there should be privately…
Introduction If you have ever had a subscription auto-renew unexpectedly, a streaming service quietly debit your account, or an EMI go through without any warning, you have experienced the gap that India’s e-mandate framework was supposed to fill. That gap is now being closed. On April 21, 2026, the Reserve Bank of India issued the…
Introduction The world of payments has steadily been reducing friction over the years, starting with cash, then moving on to cards, then digital wallets, and finally the one-click payment option. Every one of these developments has made payments faster, smoother and more convenient. In each step along this path however, one underlying principle always held…
Introduction The NPCI International Payments Limited (NIPL) has entered into a strategic partnership with ACLEDA Bank Plc., that aims to implement the Unified Payments Interface (UPI) in Cambodia, making it a boon for the Indian travellers in Cambodia who can now use UPI in order to make payments to businesses and retails present in the…
Introduction Artificial Intelligence (“AI”) is quickly evolving from the traditional digital assistant into a more personal and intelligent companion for consumers. One of the most important innovations in consumer AI has just been introduced by OpenAI which is of a personal finance feature inside the ChatGPT, which enables users to connect their bank account, investments,…
Introduction The financial system is undergoing a structural transformation that is changing how money is moved, processed, and settled globally. Historically, it was the traditional banks that stood between all money transfers, managing and controlling access to the system’s architecture and making themselves essential intermediaries to all digitized transactions. Now this whole approach seems to…
Introduction The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) has recently introduced a dedicated ‘calamity chapter’ in its recent circular on prudential norms for restructuring of advances in disaster-affected areas, marking a landmark departure from earlier regulatory policy of India with regard to dealing with issues related to disaster-induced financial stress. Prior to this development, the relief…
Introduction India’s fintech ecosystem now operates under a “dual compliance mandate”. RBI issued sectoral (or industry) norms and compliance with horizontal obligations of the Digital Personal Data Protection Act, 2023 (hereinafter referred to as the “DPDPA”) now. The result is a very complicated legal requirement for young start-ups whose business models rely on data. Both…
Introduction In April 2026, the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) introduced a significant regulatory intervention in the foreign exchange (FX) market by prohibiting banks from offering rupee non-deliverable forward (NDF) contracts to corporates. This step was taken in the face of increased FX volatility as part of an effort to discourage speculative FX trading, support…
Introduction The evolution and advancement of India’s digital payments ecosystem through UPI, IMPS, and NEFT, have grown substantially and transformed India into a world-class leader in real-time (instant) payment systems over the last decade. This transformation of how people in India spend their money has also driven a significant increase in digital payment-related frauds, with…
Introduction Tokenization of Real-World Assets (RWAs) blends traditional asset classes with blockchain technology to provide a disruptive innovation within the modern financial world. RWA tokenization involves utilizing blockchain-based digital tokens to symbolically represent ownership in tangible (e.g., properties) or intangible (e.g. intellectual property) managed assets. Deemed as verifiable, secure units of economic ownership, these tokens…
Introduction Financial decision making in India is witnessing a significant shift in its landscape. What used to be dominated by financial institutions, financial advisors, and word of mouth is now largely dominated by trends and opinions created through short-form videos and social media platforms like Instagram and YouTube, which have now moved from simply being…
Introduction India’s fintech landscape has undergone a seismic shift, propelled by the widespread adoption of UPI platforms, neobanks, and digital lending solutions. In this evolving ecosystem, customers expect support that is not only prompt but also intelligent and tailored to their individual needs. AI agents are at the forefront of this transformation, enabling users to…
Introduction For decades, the “holy grail” of fintech was frictionless commerce. We moved from the tactile exchange of paper bills to the swipe of a card, then to the “one-click” checkout, and finally to the invisible convenience of digital wallets and biometric taps. Each step reduced the distance between wanting something and owning it. As…
Introduction The Indian Fintech ecosystem is currently ranked third in the world in terms of size and is a digital phenomenon that has revolutionized how a billion people spend, save, and borrow. Yet with rapid growth and progress come systemic risks and data breaches. In May 2024, RBI finalized the framework for recognizing Self-Regulatory Organisations…
Introduction The decades-old assumption in cross-border finance was that information would flow freely unlike now. Information has ceased being a back-office by-product of financial action, and now a strategic national resource and closely linked to national security and sovereignty, as well as economic strength. The control over the streams of financial data has become regarded…
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