IT Minister asks bankers to create a platform like UPI for MSMEs

Minister for Railways, Communications, Electronics & Information Technology, Ashwini Vaishnaw, on Sunday urged the banking industry to create an innovative digital platform - as powerful, seamless and robust as UPI (Unified Payments Interface) - for providing quick and easy credit to MSMEs, small businessmen, and those at the bottom of pyramid.

The building blocks required to create such a platform are already available, given the strong ecosystem of Aadhaar, mobile phones, UPI platform and digilocker, he said asking the banking industry to come up with innovative ideas and solutions in three months.

Vaishnaw was speaking at 'Digital Payment Utsav' which was part of a weeklong showcase of India's achievements in digital space titled 'Azadi ka Digital Mahotsav' in the capital.

Throwing a "challenge" at the bankers present in the audience, the minister said: "Can we create a platform as powerful, seamless, good, as digital as UPI platform for providing very quick and easy credit to the MSME, small industries, small businessmen...people really at bottom of pyramid?"

The minister expressed willingness to look at promising concepts that are brought after three months, in response to the poser by him.

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"You have today a good ecosystem of Aadhaar, mobile phones, UPI platform, digilocker, practically everything you need to create this ecosystem is today available. Take this challenge...next three months work on it, come back and I will be very happy to spend one full day with you to look at concepts you bring," Vaishnaw said.

Speaking to reporters on the sidelines of the event, the minister further said the idea is to ensure that easy credit at good terms, through a seamless process can be made available to people at bottom of pyramid especially for micro and small industries, small businesses, street vendors among others.