India emerging as a fintech nation, third largest fintech economy: Economic Survey

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India is emerging as a fintech nation and becoming the third-largest growing fintech economy in the world, says the Economic Survey 2023-2024, published ahead of the full Union Budget set to be presented on July 23.

The survey attributes this to the government’s initiative of launching multiple flagship digitalisation schemes such as the Digital India Mission and Make-in-India.

“India's robust digital public infrastructure (DPI) has played a pivotal role in enabling the country's digital transformation, providing citizen-centric and transparent governance services,” the survey noted.

According to the survey, India’s fast-growing population, world-class DPI, and proactive regulations have underpinned the fintech industry's growth. The country has seen tremendous growth in digital payments since Covid.

“Greater emphasis has been given to the creation of DPIs such as Aadhaar, e-KYC, Aadhaar-enabled Payment System, UPI, Bharat QR, DigiLocker, e-sign, Account Aggregator, Open Network for Digital Commerce among other initiatives,” the Economic Survey said.

The startups riding on the back of government-built digital public infrastructure programmes in the fintech sector have raised more than $15 billion since 2020.

The role of startups and fintechs has been duly appreciated by the survey adding that they have helped scale operations and take the products to millions of people.

“These DPIs can be utilised on a shared basis by different players to ensure optimum outcomes. Their usage has brought transparency, scale operation and timely delivery of financial services to the public,” the Economic Survey said.