Committee on Digital Payments

A committee was constituted by Department of Economic Affairs, under the Chairmanship of Shri Ratan P. Watal, Former Finance Secretary and Principal Adviser, Niti Aayog, in August 2016 to review medium term measures necessary to promote digital payment system in the country. This Committee on Digital Payments has recommended structural reforms in the payment eco system, including amendments to the Payment and Settlement Systems Act, 2007. The report of the Committee is available on the website of the Ministry of Finance at http://finmin.nic.in

Pursuant to the Government Initiative to promote digital payments, two committees were constituted in Niti Aayog; (i) Cabinet Secretariat constituted a Committee of Secretaries under the chairmanship of CEO, NITI Aayog on Friday, 25th November 2016 to identify and operationalize in the earliest possible time frame user friendly digital payment options in all sectors of the economy and (ii) NITI Aayog constituted a Committee of Chief Ministers with Shri Chandra Babu Naidu, Hon’ble Chief Minister of Andhra Pradesh as the Convener on 30th November 2016 for suggesting measures to seamlessly enable all sections of the population to migrate to the digital mode of payment as well as to recommend measures that would enable India to leapfrog into the advanced digital payment systems that compares with the best global standards.

The Committee of Chief Ministers submitted its interim report to Hon’ble Prime Minister on 24th January 2017. The interim report of the Committee of Chief Ministers on digital payments can be seen on http://niti.gov.in/writereaddata/files/new_initiatives/book.pdf.

This was stated by Shri Arjun Ram Meghwal, Minister of State in the Ministry of Finance in written reply to a question in Lok Sabha today.