India’s Unified Payments Interface — better known as UPI — and Singapore’s PayNow were officially connected on Tuesday, allow for a “real-time payment linkage”. A phone call between Prime Minister Narendra Modi and his Singaporean counterpart Lee Hsien Loong kicked off the virtual launch. “Today is a special day for India-Singapore friendship and our efforts to deepen collaboration in FinTech and innovation. “My friend PM Lee Sien Loong’s participation made this morning’s programme even more special,” Mr. Modi said. The link is intended to facilitate financial transactions for the Indian diaspora.
Singapore has now become the first country to offer cross-border Person to Person (P2P) payment services. “This will benefit the Indian diaspora in Singapore, particularly migrant workers/students, and bring the benefits of digitalisation and FINTECH to the common man through instantaneous and low-cost money transfer from Singapore to India and vice versa,” the Ministry of External Affairs said. UPI payments via QR codes are already being accepted in Singapore, albeit at a limited number of locations.
“I am delighted to announce today the link between PayNow and India’s Unified Payments Interface (UPI) with Prime Minister Narendra Modi. “Congratulations to the Singapore Monetary Authority, the Reserve Bank of India, and all the stakeholders in Singapore and India who have helped make the linkage a reality,” Lee Hsien Loong said at the event. Using their mobile phones, the Governor of the Reserve Bank of India, Shaktikanta Das, and the Managing Director of the Monetary Authority of Singapore, Ravi Menon, demonstrated the link.