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New Delhi: India plans to bat for its signature digital public infrastructure (DPI) platforms at the upcoming 78th session of the UN General Assembly starting in September—an annual congregation of some 200 countries.Through its promotional activities, India hopes to win the backing at multilateral forums like the UN for projects related to India’s DPI platforms, including UPI, or Unified Payments Interface, Mint has learnt.
New Delhi: India plans to bat for its signature digital public infrastructure (DPI) platforms at the upcoming 78th session of the UN General Assembly starting in September—an annual congregation of some 200 countries.Through its promotional activities, India hopes to win the backing at multilateral forums like the UN for projects related to India’s DPI platforms, including UPI, or Unified Payments Interface, Mint has learnt.
This would enable New Delhi to pitch its ‘India Stack’— digital solutions implemented at population-scale to deliver social benefits—to the developing world.
This would enable New Delhi to pitch its ‘India Stack’— digital solutions implemented at population-scale to deliver social benefits—to the developing world.
New Delhi hopes that this in turn will make Indian platforms the benchmark for the global development of DPIs and cement its place as a key technology-partner amid a worldwide move toward digitalization.
Digital public infrastructure has become a key facet of India’s diplomatic outreach to the developing world, riding on the back of UPI, the Aadhaar bio-metric digital identity system and data management systems like DigiLocker.
India has already expended significant diplomatic energy in exporting UPI. In its neighbourhood alone, Bhutan and Nepal are already using UPI while Sri Lanka announced its intention to roll out the platform during President Ranil Wickremesinghe’s recent visit.
According to foreign secretary Vinay Mohan Kwatra, UPI could be operational in Sri Lanka in the next 2-3 months. India and Singapore also agreed to link their national payments platforms this year.
The National Payments Corporation of India (NPCI) is currently in talks with a number of Gulf nations, including Saudi Arabia and Bahrain, to build digital systems and expand cross-border remittances.
India’s skill and experience with developing and deploying digital platforms at scale has become a key part of New Delhi’s push to project itself as a technologically advanced nation capable of delivering workable solutions to global challenges.
The push comes as India positions itself as a champion of developing countries that are grappling with debt crises, food insecurity and climate change.
“Digital public goods developed by India in fields like electronic-payments, health, education, or e-governance, can be useful for many other developing countries," Prime Minister Modi said in January this year.
He was talking to representatives from developing nations during a Voices of the Global South Summit.
In June, India signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with Antigua and Barbuda, Armenia, Sierra Leone and Suriname on sharing India Stack.
India is in talks with a number of other developing countries in Latin America, Africa and Southeast Asia, to extend these DPI partnerships.
Modi told the G20 Summit in Bali last year, “Our digital payments ecosystem has been developed as a free public good."
“Examples like UPI can be templates for many other countries too. We would be happy to share our experience with the world and the G20 can be a vehicle for this."
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