Prime Minister Shri Narendra Modi and Prime Minister of Singapore, Mr. Lee Hsien Loong participated in the virtual launch of real time payment linkage between the Unified Payments Interface (UPI) of India and PayNow of Singapore.
Key points
- Singapore is the first country with which cross border Person to Person (P2P) payment facility has been launched. This will help the Indian diaspora in Singapore, especially migrant workers/students and bring the benefits of digitalisation and FINTECH to the common man through instantaneous and low-cost transfer of money from Singapore to India and vice-versa.
- Acceptance of UPI payments through QR codes is already available in selected merchant outlets in Singapore.
- Singapore is one of the top four inward remittance markets, accounting for approximately 5.7 percent of total remittances to India, or about $5.08 billion of the $100 billion total inward remittance market.
- A digital linkage between India’s UPI and Singapore’s Pay Now means a seamless real-time fund transfers will be available for citizens of both countries, allowing for economic growth, cultural development, and social cohesion.
- As per the ministry of external affairs (MEA) document Population of Overseas Indians (2022), there are approximately 6.5 lakh Indians, including non-resident Indians and persons of Indian origin, currently residing in Singapore.
- The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) said that the linkage will be a significant milestone in the development of next-generation infrastructure for cross-border payments between India and Singapore.
- It will also closely align with the G20’s financial inclusion priorities of driving faster, cheaper and more transparent cross-border payments.
