India To Now Extend Its UPI Payment Service To Maldives

India and Maldives have inked a pact to roll out Unified Payments Interface (UPI) in the Indian Ocean archipelago as external affairs minister S Jaishankar said that the move will have a positive impact on the tourism sector.

The memorandum of understanding (MoU) was signed between the National Payments Corporation of India and the Maldives’ economic development and trade ministry after Jaishankar concluded his meeting with Maldivian counterpart Moosa Zameer.

Jaishankar began a three-day visit to the Maldives on Friday, his first since the government of President Mohamed Muizzu assumed office in November last year.

In a post on X, Jaishankar said, “Held productive discussions today with Foreign Minister@MoosaZameerin Malé. Witnessed signing of MoU between National Payments Corporation of India and Ministry of Economic Development and Trade of Maldives on the introduction of digital payment system in the Maldives.”

Besides this, the minister also announced the inauguration of six high-impact projects in street lighting, mental health, children’s speech therapy and special education with his Maldivian counterpart. 

The two sides also renewed another MoU between India’s National Centre for Good Governance and the Civil Service Commission of the Maldives for an additional 1,000 slots for training Maldivian civil servants.

In May, it was reported that Maldives was planning to roll out India’s Rupay service to “bolster the Maldivian Rufiyaa”.

In January, the relationship between the two countries worsened after a Maldivian deputy minister, along with other cabinet members and government officials, made “disparaging and unsavoury” references to Primer Minister Narendra Modi’s then Lakshadweep visit and call to development of the Indian archipelago as a global retreat for beach tourism.

Following this, many startups took a pro-India stance and boycotted Maldives in some way or another. For instance,  InsuranaceDekho suspended travel insurance to Maldives saying, “We stand united with our country and in solidarity.” Another traveltech major Easemytrip also announced the suspension of all flight bookings for Maldives. 

On similar lines, traveltech startup MakeMyTrip launched a ‘Beaches of India’ campaign providing offers and discounts to encourage Indian travellers to explore “the country’s stunning beaches”.

This comes at the heart of India’s expansion of its RuPay and UPI offering globally with Sri Lanka, France, Mauritius, Bhutan, Nepal, the UAE and Canada among the companies to deploy the payment infrastructure in their countries. 

The latest in this spree is the NPCI foraying into Qatar after partnering with Qatar National Bank (QNB), enabling Indian tourists to make QR code-based UPI payments across QNB’s merchant network in Qatar. 

Not to mention,  the UPI transaction volume in July stood at INR 20.64 Lakh Cr, 2.8 % higher than June’s INR 20.07 Lakh Cr, according to the data released by National Payments Corporation of India.