Government’s next offer: Swipe card and win prizes

The new and novel initiative is aimed at luring more merchants and consumers and accelerate the activity of digital transaction across the country. The Centre in a release said that there has been a remarkable increase in both volume and amount of digital payment transactions since November 8. However, it is necessary to ensure that electronic payments are adopted by all sections of the society. 

The decision comes after the NITI Aayog requested the National Payment Corporation of India (NPCI) to conceptualise and launch a new scheme to incentivise digital payments. 

The highlights of the proposed incentives scheme are that all consumers and merchants using digital payments will be eligible for the lucky draw scheme. There will be two levels of incentive amounts available under the scheme. The first one is weekly lucky draw of the transaction IDs generated in that particular week, the contours of which are being finalized and the second is quarterly draw for grand prizes. While designing the scheme the focus will be on poor, lower middle class and small businesses. All modes of digital payments- viz. USSD, AEPS, UPI and RuPay Cards- will be eligible.