The National Payments Corporation of India (NPCI) said on Thursday that Nepal will be the first country to embrace India’s UPI system, which will play a key role in revolutionising the digital economy of the neighbouring country.
To deliver the services in Nepal, NPCI International Payments Ltd (NIPL), NPCI’s international branch, has partnered with Gateway Payments Service (GPS) and Manam Infotech.
In Nepal, GPS is the authorised payment system operator, and Manam Infotech will implement the Unified Payments Interface (UPI) there.
According to NPCI, the partnership would benefit Nepal’s greater digital public good by bolstering interoperable real-time person-to-person (P2P) and person-to-merchant (P2M) transactions in the neighbouring nation.
“WE EXPECT UPI IN NEPAL WOULD PLAY A PIVOTAL ROLE IN TRANSFORMING THE DIGITAL ECONOMY OF THE COUNTRY AND DREAMS OF BUILDING A LESS-CASH SOCIETY,” RAJESH PRASAD MANANDHAR, CEO OF GPS SAID.
In 2021, UPI had facilitated 3,900 crore financial transactions worth USD 940 billion, which is almost 31% of India’s GDP.
Nepal’s population is estimated to be over 30 million (3 crores), with roughly 45 per cent of the population banked. According to NPCI, Nepal has a mobile penetration rate of over 135%, with 65 per cent of the population owning a smartphone. This gives a solid foundation for the digital revolution in India to be reproduced in Nepal. In the next months, the three firms will collaborate closely to bring UPI to Nepal, complete with all of the functionality and features now accessible in India.
