HC notice to RBI, Google India on UPI interoperability rules

New Delhi: The Delhi high court has issued notice to the Centre and Reserve Bank of India on a plea seeking suspension of operations of Google India Digital services in UPI through its app “Google Pay” till it complies with interoperability rules completely.

The single-judge bench of Justice Asha Menon, in an order made available on the website today, also issued notice to Google India and directed the respondents to file replies within three weeks with advance copies to the counsel for the petitioner. The petitioner may file rejoinders, if any, within 10 days thereafter.

The plea sought directions to bar Google India from expanding its user base till a thorough audit of the Google Pay app is conducted by an independent third party. The petitioner also sought penalty and punitive actions against Google.

“... the petitioner in order to contribute by way of donation in PM Cares fund in view of the covid-19 pandemic, decided to use ‘Google Pay’ ... However, the application did not allow the petitioner to proceed with the transaction without adding account details ...coerces user to make another VPA/UPI ID of Google Pay in order to make transaction ...," the petition reads.

This is restricting users from making payments by introducing the entry barrier of adding bank account just to increase the market share and it is taking undue advantage of the covid-19 situation to increase its user data base, the plea alleged.

The plea alleged that GooglePay flouted National Payments Corporation of India (NPCI) guidelines on interoperability as UPI payment platforms need to give a choice to users to transact using their existing IDs.

In January 2017, during UPI registrations, NPCI had said no merchant should force the customer to create a VPA or register for UPI to avail any services on a merchant app," the NPCI circular had said.