VSS Steps down: Vijay Shekhar Sharma has stepped down as the part-time Chairman and board member of Paytm Payments Bank.

The banking arm of listed fintech Paytm will now be led by a reconstituted board, with the company in process of appointing a new chairman.

“One 97 Communications Ltd (OCL) would like to update that its associate, Paytm Payments Bank Limited (PPBL), has reconstituted its Board of Directors with the appointment of Ex-Central Bank of India Chairman Srinivasan Sridhar, retired IAS officer Debendranath Sarangi, former Executive Director of Bank of Baroda Ashok Kumar Garg, and Retired IAS Rajni Sekhri Sibal. They have recently joined as Independent Directors,” the company informed in a regulatory filing.

On January 31, The Reserve Bank clamped down on Paytm Payments Bank (PPBL), restricting the platform from accepting deposits and credits after March 15 due to persistent non-compliances.

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Earlier today, Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman chaired a meeting with the top officials of 50 fintech companies. Representatives of Paytm were not part of the discussion. 

The meeting was attended by top executives of RazorPay, PhonePe, Google Pay and Amazon Pay among others, along with NPCI officials. After the meeting with the fintechs, the Finance Minister has also reportedly sought a monthly review meeting with the startups in the sector.

Last week, RBI advised the National Payments Corporation of India (NPCI) to examine the possibility of migrating the users from PPBL to four to five other banks. PPBL has 30 crore wallets and 3 crore bank customers.

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The RBI's restriction on Paytm Payments Bank (PPBL) has also impacted transaction from wallet and FASTag. The reason for the restrictions was due to ‘persistent non-compliance’ and continued material supervisory concerns, RBI said.

The central bank governor ruled out any review of the restrictions, which barred Paytm from accepting deposits and top-ups in prepaid instruments, wallets and FASTags among other services.

In 2022, RBI had halted the onboarding of customers on Paytm Payments Bank, with the reason for this action stemming from a discrepancy in linking PAN cards to the nodal accounts.

Paytm Payments Bank was founded in 2017, and has over 300 million wallets and 30 million bank accounts.