Friday, 12 Sep, 2025
By: Anshul Vipat
While India is way behind Germany in economical terms, its digital infrastructure is at par with developed economies. Since 2013, India has transferred more than ₹24.8 lakh crore through Direct Benefit Transfer (DBT).
In India, doing transactions digitally is simple, quick and hassle free. However, that's not the case in other countries. Take Germany for example. The largest economy in Europe is finding it difficult to perform digital transactions. According to reports, the country is unable to transfer money to citizens in need of help with their energy bills because their account numbers are not linked with their tax IDs. The process of linking it will take close to 18 months.
Despite being a devloped economy, Germany lags behind when it comes to bringing its industry and public sector into the digital age. The country is ranked 13 in the European Commission’s Digital Economy and Society Index, behind France in the ranking of how well countries are doing on internet access, digital skills and online public services. More than half of the German household lacks fast fiber optic connections.
India fast emerging as a digital powerhouse
While India is way behind Germany in economical terms, its digital infrastructure is at par with developed economies.
Since 2013, India has transferred more than ₹24.8 lakh crore through Direct Benefit Transfer (DBT). In the single financial year 2021-22, India has transferred around Rs 6.3 lakh crore digitally. On an average, above 90 lakh DBT payments were processed daily in the last fiscal. In June, the government transferred around Rs 20,000 crore was directly into bank accounts of more than 10 crore beneficiaries under the 11th installment of PM Kisan Samman Nidhi Yojana. It's the outcome of our robust digital infrastructure that the country is able to made more than 10 crore transactions at the click of a button on a single day. Similarly, India conducted 5.3 crore Aadhaar authentications per day (August 2022) and filed over 70 lakh income tax returns in a single day on July 31, 2022.
The great UPI story
The biggest success of India's digital infrastructure is the country's inbuilt Unified Payments Interface (UPI) that has made sending and receiving money a breeze. The country's flagship digital program clocked in 657 crore transactions in August 2022 worth Rs10.47 lakh crores.
According to the data released by the National Payment, the platform reported 6.6 billion transactions worth Rs 10.73 trillion in August 2022. UPI transactions by volume rose 85% on year, while it was up nearly 68% by value as compared to last year. In FY22, UPI processed more than 46 billion transactions amounting to over ₹84.17 trillion. During FY21, UPI processed 22.28 billion transactions, with an aggregate value of Rs41.03 trillion. There has been a constant month-on-month increase in UPI transactions over the years and the number of transactions has nearly doubled since last year. The instant real-time payment system was developed by NPCI in 2016, for facilitating inter-bank transactions, has morphed into a simple, uncomplicated mobile payments option, embraced by Indians in spectacular numbers.
UPI is also set to go global. NPCI International Payments Limited (NIPL), the international arm of NPCI is presently engaged with more than 30 countries for the adoption of UPI. It has partnered with domestic companies in countries like UAE, France Singapore, Bhutan and Nepal to enable Indians to make use of UPI when they travel. Today, merchants in Bhutan, Cambodia, Malaysia, Philippines, Singapore and Vietnam already accept UPI payments, thanks to cross border payment agreements.
The massive success of UPI and DBT has put the country as a global leader in digital infrastructure. Guess, Germany should take India's help to improve its digital infrastructure.
