Hooked on digital payments? Here’s what budget 2023 has in store for you

Nirmala Sitharaman, presenting the Union Budget on Wednesday, emphasised on how digitisation has helped the Indian economy and also laid out how the Centre plans to leverage India's ever-widening digital infrastructure. Sitharaman said digital payments have seen a huge rise across the country, enabling a formalisation of the economy. She added that there has been a 76% rise in the number of digital payments and a 91% rise in value. 

The digital ecosystem's role in enabling the Indian economy was laid out as follows:  

UPI

Payments worth Rs 126 lakh crore were made through Unified Payment Interface (UPI) in 2022. The economy has also become more formalised. EPFO membership has nearly doubled going up to 27 crore.Sitharaman said fiscal support for digital public infrastructure will continue in 2023-24. 

KYC process 

The Centre has also decided to simplify the Know Your Customer (KYC) process. The process will be simplified using a risk-based approach instead of a one-size fits all. Financial regulators will be encouraged to use a KYC system fully amenable to the needs of Digital India. 

Common Business Identifier

For business establishments required to have a Permanent Account Number (PAN). PAN will be used as the common identifier for all digital systems of specified government agencies. This will help improve ease of doing business, and will be facilitated through a legal mandate.   

Fintech services 

India's fintech services facilitated by the digital public infrastructure, which includes Aadhaar, PM Jan Dhan Yojana, Video KYC, will receive a bigger push. The scope of documents in DigiLocker will be expanded. 

'India a bright star'

Nirmala Sithraman said the world recognises India as a bright star adding that India is the fastest-growing economy in the world among major economies. “The world has recognised India as a bright star despite a massive global slowdown caused by pandemic and the war. Our growth for the current year is estimated at 7.0 percent – highest among all the major world economies", she said in Parliament.

"The Indian economy is on the right track and is heading to a bright future. Our focus on reforms and sound policies resulting in Jan Bhagidari helped us in trying times, our rising global profile is due to several accomplishments.,” she added.