The Committee on Digital Payments, headed by former Finance Secretary Ratan P. Watal, submitted its final report suggesting measures to boost cashless transactions in the medium term, to Finance Minister Arun Jaitley. The Committee constituted by the Ministry of Finance under the chairmanship of Ratan P. Watal, Principal Advisor, NITI Aayog and former Finance Secretary has submitted its final report to the Finance Minister.

• In its report, the Committee has recommended that a medium term strategy for accelerating growth of digital payments in India with a regulatory regime which is conducive to bridging the digital divide by promoting competition, open access and interoperability in payments.
• The report recommends inclusion of financially and socially excluded groups and assimilation of emerging technologies in the market, while safeguarding security of digital transactions and providing level playing to all stakeholders and new players who will enter this new transaction space.
• It has suggested inter-operability of the payments system between banks and non-banks, up-gradation of the digital payment infrastructure and institutions and a framework to reward innovations and for leading efforts in enabling digital payments.
• The government had constituted the Committee on August 23 to review the payment systems in the country and to recommend appropriate measures for encouraging digital payments.