Digital India: A New Financial Beginning?

The Digital India campaign was launched in the year 2015, and since then the banking industry and the fintech industry are working toward making the revolutionary dream a success. In a country like India where 65.07 % of the population resides in the rural areas, it becomes really difficult for government schemes and monetary support to reach safe hands and be used for the proposed plans. So, it is believed that digitization can be the ultimate solution to smooth and safe financial transactions. However, with digitization, financial frauds have also multiplied, and many people are falling prey to frauds and are cheated of their hard-earned money. With the BBPS API, a safe and reliable payment system, already popular in urban areas and amongst the ones who are tech-savvy, there was a need to find a simpler, safer, and more effective way for financial transactions, especially withdrawals, where people can safely withdraw their money. With safety in mind and with the insight to make banking services far-reaching mATMs are introduced. The MATM PRICE is affordable and can be used by banks or vendors to disburse cash, especially in remote locations.

How is mATM beneficial?

The mATM has some ubiquitous benefits that are making banking services convenient along with being a banking innovation with a debit-card based interface.

• It offers a faster solution to banking services.

• Transactions can be completed with just a debit card and pin.

• It is easy to operate.

• Since it is a portable device it can be carried anywhere you want.

• It is designed to support all major banks in India.

• Long queues in ATM kiosks can be avoided.

• The Franchisee who plans to deliver the mATM service needs just a mobile app and device for the service.

• mATM does not require biometrics for authentication and only a debit does the work.

Introduction of CSCs to promote Digital India:

The Ministry of Electronics and IT has set up CSCs or Common Service Centers, which is a scheme that will provide citizens with a centralized collaborative framework to deliver systematic services. The idea behind Common Service Center is to build an IT-enabled network as a customer service point that will help in connecting the local population with the government departments, banks, educational institutions, insurance companies, and businesses that will help in impacting the country’s economy. However, to expand the CSCs to the gram panchayat level and cover the rural area under this scheme the Government of India introduced the CSC 2.0 scheme. The CSC 2.0 is crafted to deliver e-services anywhere in India. This scheme will ensure a self-sufficient network across gram panchayats, Avail a large bouquet of e-services but in a single platform, promote VLEs or Village Level Entrepreneurs through a sustainable plan of commission sharing with special encouragement to women VLEs, and help standardization of services and capacity building of stakeholders. Another important service of the CSCs is the AEPS (Aadhar Enabled Payment System) and the mATMs to provide financial transactions in a smooth and safe way across India.

Are mATMs pathbreaking?

The mATMs are meant to be an instrument to convey basic banking services. The Business Correspondence, who can also be the local grocer, can conduct prompt transactions using this platform. This micro plaform works through cost-effective devices connected to banks around India. The mATMs support basic banking services such as deposits, withdrawals, fund transfers, and balance inquiries. The device is connected with a mobile app and enables withdrawal or deposit with the customer’s debit card and identity verification. However, unlike their name, micro ATMs don’t have stored cash and are used as a touchpoint to enable withdrawal or deposit. The cash is, however, provided by the business correspondence. The mATM can be widely used in remote locations and far away villages where it is difficult to run seamless banking services. Moreover, the mATM assures a safe and secure transaction and that too few steps away from the comfort of your home. By including the local business correspondence as a franchisee of the mATM, the government is planning to bring banking services at your ease by valuing customer comfort and also empowers the local business correspondents, who in return are benefited through commissions. For ease of use and low MATM PRICE, this concept is garnering more and more popularity. An RBI data shows that the micro ATMs deployed by banks have only increased in the following years, and are gaining steady traction over the traditional ATM kiosks, which are facing many challenges related to infrastructure and cost of maintenance and building.

Final Verdict:

The government of India’s digitization scheme is undoubtedly a financial beginning as it is paving the way for seamless transactions and making banking easier and convenient. Moreover, with the digitization scheme and with the introduction of CSCs most of the places are covered under the digital network. BBPS API, already bringing a revolution with cashless transactions and micro ATMs, on the other hand, are availing cash withdrawals without even visiting your bank or an ATM kiosk, India is on its way to making the dream of digitization a truth.