I am picking a thread of initiatives that inspired the residents of a particular locality, village, island, state, etc., to move towards cashless and digital economy and to fulfill the purpose of Digital India Initiative of the Union Government. So, let’s start from township.
Before this, Must read Excerpts of e-transactions & Digital Locker.
GNFC Township – 100% Digital
Nothing is impossible for Indians. This has shown by GNFC Township that has become the India’s first integrated industrial township to go 100% digital in all financial transactions. The Gujarat Narmada Valley Fertilizers and Chemicals (GNFC) Township in Bharuch has a population of around 5,000 and all the shops in the township viz. vegetable shops, barber shops, provision stores, cycle repairing shops, flour mills, laundries conduct their business only through cashless transactions using PoS machines or e-wallets like Paytm, BHIM , Unified Payment Interface (UPI), SBI Buddy, PhonePe, MobiKwik, etc. Here, even a paan is purchased cashless and a cup of tea is also available cashless only.
To achieve 100% cashless transactions, the mass campaign was organized by the GNFC management. They provide basic training for digital transactions, established required infrastructure and business process engineering to its residents.
Karang: India’s First Cashless Island
The Karang island is a small lake island in Manipur, which is located in the middle of Loktak, the largest freshwater lake in Northeast India. Through mass campaign for digital financial transactions, the island has become the India’s first cashless island in January 2017.
Akodara – India’s First Digital Village
“Akodara” the small village of 1200 people in Gujarat’s Sabarkantha district became the India’s first cashless and digital village in 2015. In it, all financial transactions are carried out through SMS, net-banking or debit cards, e-wallets, etc. With the help of local administration and ICICI Foundation, the village was developed as a digitized village and became a role model for rural India under Digital India initiative of Government of India (GoI).
Daman and Diu – India’s First Cashless Region
The tiny Union Territory “Daman and Diu” has become the India’s first cashless region on December 2016. Approx 190 teams of trained volunteers educated the people of the region about the benefits of cashless transactions. The local administration introduced free Wi-Fi services to promote Digital India initiative in the Union Territory.
Gujarat – First State to go Cashless for Food Grain Distribution
Gujarat – India’s first state to go cashless for the distribution of food grains. The beneficiaries under National Food Security Act (NFSA) Act 2013 will need to carry only Aadhaar cards for purchasing food grains in the state. This will help in eradicating corruption in the Public Distribution System (PDS) and will also help in stopping the leakages of grain at shop level.
Apart from this, the Gujarat government has completed the target of installing Aadhaar Enabled Payment System (AEPS) in 17,250 Fair Price Shops (FPS) much before March 31, 2017. With the help of FPSs, a consumer will also be able to reserve his Air, Rail and Bus tickets. A beneficiary can pay his mobile bill, a farmer can deposit crop insurance premium, LIC premium etc. at these centres. A farmer can also get the Soil Health Card (SHC) and registration for Centrally Sponsored Schemes.
The State Government is also trying to make provision for monthly bus travel pass for students and payment of electricity bill through these shops. Besides, one can use the computer and internet facility at the FPS.
Excerpts of e-transactions & Digital Locker
Click on a particular topic to know in-depth about their transactions and their process.
- DigiLocker: It’s a secure digital locker for your digitized version of documents. You can access and share your documents digitally for verification anytime, anywhere.
- Bharat Interface for Money (BHIM) App: The UPI-based digital payment app “BHIM” is one app for all banks, which is developed by the National Payment Corporation of India (NPCI) to enable fast, secure and reliable cashless payments through UPI platform.
- Paytm Wallet: Free and one of the simple & securest way to do cashless transaction.
- PhonePe: No charge will be levy on you while making payments through FlipKarts’s e-wallet and even withdrawal of wallet balance into your Bank account is absolutely easy and free.
- Unified Payment Interface (UPI): The UPI is an online payments solution that will facilitate the transfer of funds instantly between person to person (or peer to peer) using a smartphone.
- *99# Mobile Banking: The *99# service works without Internet & anyone can access banking services by just dialing *99#.
- Airtel Payments Bank: The Airtel bank is fully digital and paperless bank and has become the India’s first payments bank to start operations and to offer basic banking services.
- YES BANK SIMsePAY: YES BANK has launched its new digital transaction service “SIMsePAY” that allows any account holder to do money transfers, disburse their utility bills and other mobile banking services. There is no need of internet connectivity to utilize this service.
- MobiKwik Lite Android App: The MobiKwik Lite is a light mobile wallet app for mobile banking in poor connectivity regions, works smoothly on 2G/EDGE internet connections.
- State Bank Buddy: A semi-closed prepaid e-wallet of State Bank of India (SBI) that can be used to transfer money to other wallet users and bank accounts, anytime, anywhere.
- State Bank MobiCash (SBMC) mobile wallet: The digital wallet service has been launched by the State Bank of India (SBI) in partnership with BSNL to allow users to deposit cash through BSNL retail outlets and withdraw funds from their account.
