Cabinet Clears ₹1,500 Crore Incentive for UPI Ecosystem

Approvals also accorded for new fertilizer plant, highway, and revised dairy schemes

- Manas Pimpalkhare & Shayan Ghosh

The Union cabinet chaired by Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Wednesday cleared projects worth ₹22,791 crore for the continuation of the Centre's UPI incentive, building a new urea plant in Assam as well as a new highway to boost port connectivity in Maharashtra, and development of dairy farming.

Union Minister of Information and Broadcasting Ashwini Vaishnaw announced a ₹1,500-crore Digital India Incentive for the Unified Payments Interface.

This would provide a 0.15% incentive to industry participants for UPI transactions of less than ₹2,000 from customers to small merchants for FY25.

"The incentive scheme for promotion of low-value BHIM-UPI transactions (P2M) will be implemented at an estimated outlay of ₹1,500 crore, from 01.04.2024 to 31.03.2025," a Cabinet statement said. P2M refers to person-to-merchant transactions.