About the National Payments Corporation of India
- The National Payments Corporation of India (NPCI) is an umbrella organisation created to operate retail payment and settlement systems across India.
- It was established in December 2008 as a joint initiative of the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) and the Indian Banks’ Association (IBA) under the Payment and Settlement Systems Act, 2007, and is incorporated as a not-for-profit company under Section 8 of the Companies Act, 2013.
- The RBI classified NPCI as a System Wide Important Payment System (SWIPS) in June 2020.
Ownership & Governance
- Headquarters: Mumbai, Maharashtra.
- Leadership: Governed by a board including Non-Executive Chairman Biswamohan Mahapatra and Managing Director & CEO Dilip Asbe, alongside RBI and promoter-bank nominees.
- Shareholding: Originally promoted by ten core banks — including SBI, PNB, Canara Bank, Bank of Baroda, ICICI, HDFC, Citibank, and HSBC — now broad-based across 65 entities spanning public, private, foreign, regional rural, and co-operative banks.
- Subsidiaries: NPCI Bharat BillPay Limited (NBBL) manages the Bharat Bill Payment System (BBPS/Bharat Connect); NPCI International Payments Limited (NIPL), formed in April 2020, deploys NPCI’s systems globally.
Core Products & Digital Infrastructure
- UPI: Launched in April 2016, enabling real-time bank-to-bank transfers and accounting for nearly half of global real-time payment volumes.
- RuPay: India’s domestic card scheme, with exclusive integration for UPI credit payments.
- Other Platforms: BHIM (mobile payment app built on UPI), IMPS (instant inter-bank transfers), NFS (interbank ATM network), NACH (recurring electronic clearing), BBPS (bill payments), and AEPS, CTS, and NCMC for Aadhaar-based, cheque, and contactless payments respectively.
Global Expansion & Security
- International Linkages: Through NIPL, UPI and RuPay acceptance has expanded to 11 countries, including Singapore (via a UPI-PayNow linkage), the UAE, France, Mauritius, Nepal, Bhutan, and Sri Lanka.
- Security Framework: The UPI Information Security Compliance Framework 2025 mandates security audits for participating banks, payment service providers, and third-party application providers.
Conclusion
As the operator of UPI, RuPay, and India’s core payment rails, NPCI occupies a systemically important position in the country’s financial infrastructure, with its mandate now extending into global payment interoperability.
| This concept has been elaborately discussed in the following article – 7th GLOBAL FINTECH FEST 2026 |