NPCI collaborates with CSC eGov to launch Aadhaar Enabled Payment System

 National Payments Corporation of India (NPCI), the umbrella organisation for all retail payment systems in the country has collaborated with CSC e-Governance Services India Limited to launch Aadhaar Enabled Payment System (AePS) at locations where CSC eGov has been acting as Business Correspondent of banks.  The service was inaugurated at Ariyankuppam Grama Panchayat, Puducherry by Shri V. Sabapathy, Speaker of Puducherry Legislative Assembly in the presence of Shri Balachandran M., Chairman, NPCI and Shri A. P. Hota, MD & CEO, NPCI. 

Shri Balachandran M. pointed out that the CSC service outlets which were hither to provide citizen services of various types, would now be able to offer financial services too on digital platform by partnering with banks in a much bigger way. The thrust would be on under-banked and unbanked locations in the country. "CSC eGov can play a crucial role in combining the financial inclusion programme with Digital India programme and NPCI is proud to be associated with CSC eGov", said Shri A. P. Hota, MD & CEO, NPCI. 

Shri R. R. Singh, Head, Operations of CSC EGov said that it has been envisaged to cover the entire Puducherry with over 60 CSC locations by the end of March 2016. The model will be replicated to all 1,40,000 CSC EGov locations the country in a phased manner. Shri Singh told that they plan to increase the number of CSCs to 2,50,000 in an years time to ensure that each gram panchayat has been covered and customers of banks get the service in their vicinity. He also addedthat Ariyankuppam CSC is the Business Correspondent of IndusInd Bank as CSC EGov outlets provide banking services as an agent of the Bank.

Aadhaar enabled Payment System is safe, secure and an easy to use payment platform. The customers can avail the benefit by using Aadhaar number and finger prints. This system is based on the demographic and biometric/iris information of an individual, which eliminates the threat of any fraud and non-genuine activity. Aadhaar will facilitate ‘anytime, anywhere, anyhow’ authentication to its beneficiary.  

This system facilitates disbursement of government entitlements like NREGA, Social Security pension, Handicapped Old Age Pension etc. of any Central or State Government bodies, using Aadhaar and authentication thereof as supported by UIDAI.

NPCI: 

National Payments Corporation of India (NPCI) was set up in 2009 as the central infrastructure for various retail payment systems in India and was envisaged by the Reserve Bank of India as the payment utility for all banks in the country. During the last five years, the organization has grown multi-fold from 2 million transactions a day to 20 million transactions now. From a single service of switching of inter-bank ATM transactions, the range of services has grown to Cheque Clearing, Immediate Payments Service money transfer (24x7), Automated Clearing House, Electronic Benefit Transfer and a domestic card payment network named ‘RuPay’ to provide an alternative to international card schemes. Currently, there are over 225 Million RuPay Cards in circulation.

About CSC eGov

Customer Service Centre is an outfit of Department of Electronics and Information Technology (DEITY) has so far Set up over 1,40,000 CSCs, which provide various services like Aadhaar enrolment, Death, Birth & Domicile certificate, PAN application etc. The scope of activities will now be extended to provide banking services, which in addition to customer convenience will also increase CSCs income as banks will pay remuneration to them for the purpose. CSC locations will provide Aadhaar number & Biometric based authentication and Card & Pin based services to enable the bank customers to conduct financial & non-financial banking transactions.