Daily Brief

DPI Brief — August 09, 2026 India’s Digital Public Infrastructure ecosystem saw significant activity across multiple layers this week — from a landmark Supreme Court hearing on the tension between data protection and transparency laws, to GeM crossing a ₹20 lakh crore procurement milestone on its tenth anniversary. GeM Completes a Decade, Crosses ₹20 Lakh Crore in Cumulative Procurement Layer: L4 — Commerce (GeM) The Government e-Marketplace (GeM) completes ten years of operations on August 9, marking a significant milestone in India’s digital governance journey. As of August 7, the platform has facilitated cumulative procurement worth over ₹20 lakh crore through more than 3.78 crore orders, according to the Ministry of Commerce and Industry. ...

DPI Brief — August 08, 2026 Lok Sabha Passes Bill Enabling MDR on UPI — L2 Payments The Lok Sabha on August 6 passed the Taxation and Other Laws (Amendment) Bill, 2026, amending the Payment and Settlement Systems Act, 2007 to empower the Central Government to permit banks and payment service providers to levy charges on UPI and other notified electronic payment modes. The amendment removes the legal restriction on charging Merchant Discount Rate (MDR), a long-standing policy that made UPI effectively free for all parties. ...

DPI Brief — August 07, 2026 1. Parliament Passes Bill Amending Payment and Settlement Systems Act — UPI MDR Legal Framework Created (L2: Payments) The Lok Sabha on August 6 passed the Taxation and Other Laws (Amendment) Bill, 2026, which amends Section 10A of the Payment and Settlement Systems Act, 2007. The amendment removes the legal provision that prevented banks and payment service providers from charging a Merchant Discount Rate (MDR) on UPI transactions, creating the legal authority for the government to notify MDR charges in the future. ...

DPI Brief — August 06, 2026 Government Moves to Legalise Merchant Fees on High-Value UPI Transactions [L2 — Payments] The Union government tabled the Taxation and Other Laws (Amendment) Bill, 2026 in Parliament on August 5, proposing amendments to the Payment and Settlement Systems Act that would remove UPI’s blanket statutory exemption from the Merchant Discount Rate (MDR). The Bill itself does not impose charges — it creates the legal framework that would allow the government to notify MDR on specific digital payment modes in the future. ...

DPI Brief — August 04, 2026 1. Payments Act Amendment Clears Path for UPI MDR — L2 (Payments) The Finance Ministry has proposed amending the Payment and Settlement Systems Act to scrap the zero-MDR (Merchant Discount Rate) provision that has kept UPI transactions free for merchants since 2020. The proposed amendment shifts the power to notify “fee-protected” payment modes from RBI to the Centre — a move widely seen as a precursor to introducing merchant charges on UPI payments. ...

DPI Brief — August 03, 2026 UPI Smashes All-Time Record — 23.66 Billion Transactions in July The National Payments Corporation of India (NPCI) released its July 2026 data on August 2, confirming that UPI processed a record 23.66 billion transactions worth ₹29.88 lakh crore — the highest-ever monthly volume. That translates to roughly 763 million payments per day, averaging ₹96,383 crore in daily throughput. Compared to June’s 22.72 billion transactions, volume grew 4.1% month-on-month, while value rose 3.3% from ₹28.92 lakh crore. Year-on-year, the growth is even starker — volume surged 22% and value jumped 19% from July 2025. The previous volume record was 23.20 billion set in May 2026. With UPI now powering nearly 85% of India’s digital payments, the numbers underline how deeply embedded the rail has become across every transaction tier — from street vendors to enterprise payouts. ...

DPI Brief — August 02, 2026 NPCI’s August 1 UPI Overhaul: Caps, Autopay Restrictions, and Fraud Controls Layer 2 — Payments Starting August 1, the National Payments Corporation of India (NPCI) has enforced sweeping operational changes to UPI aimed at preventing the kind of server outages seen in April-May 2025. The new rules, notified via NPCI’s May 21 circular on UPI and API usage guidelines, introduce hard daily caps on balance checks (limited per app), restrict linked bank account views to 25 per day, and cap payment reversal requests at 10 per 30 days. Autopay mandate executions are now limited to one attempt plus three retries per mandate, and all autopay processing is restricted to non-peak hours (outside 10:00–13:00 and 17:00–21:30). Transaction status checks for pending payments are limited to three attempts with a 90-second cooling period between each. ...

DPI Brief — August 01, 2026 CKYC 2.0 Goes Live: India’s “One Nation, One KYC” Vision Takes Shape Layer: L1 (Identity) Starting August 1, India’s upgraded Central Know Your Customer (CKYC) 2.0 framework has begun rolling out across banks and insurance companies, with mutual funds and stockbrokers to follow in phased onboarding. Developed jointly by RBI, SEBI, and IRDAI, the system lets customers complete KYC verification once and reuse those records across all participating financial institutions—eliminating the repetitive document submissions that have plagued Indian financial onboarding for years. ...

DPI Brief — July 31, 2026 NPCI Orders Phone Number Masking on UPI Apps, Pushes Username IDs as Default The National Payments Corporation of India (NPCI) has directed all banks and UPI applications to mask customers’ full mobile numbers during transactions and make username-based UPI IDs the default for new sign-ups. The circular, issued this week, requires that only the last four digits of a mobile number be visible to the counterparty. For QR code transactions, apps must not display the mobile number after payment completion. Banks and payment apps have been given a September 4, 2026 deadline for full compliance. ...

DPI Brief — July 30, 2026 NPCI Orders Phone Number Masking on UPI Apps by September 4 Layer: L2 — Payments The National Payments Corporation of India (NPCI) has directed all UPI apps and partner banks to mask users’ mobile phone numbers, making username-based UPI IDs the default identifier for new users. The directive, reported by Business Standard and CXO Today, sets a September 4 compliance deadline. The move is explicitly framed as alignment with the Digital Personal Data Protection (DPDP) Act’s requirements on how companies collect, store, and share personal data. ...