Mastercard And Mahendra Singh Dhoni Come Together To Build Team Cashless India

The nationwide initiative aims to strengthen acceptance of digital payments among merchants

Praveen Khandelwal, National Secretary General, Confederation of All India Traders; Cricketer Mahendra Singh Dhoni and Ari Sarker, Co-President, Asia Pacific, Mastercard at the launch of 'Team Cashless India'.

Mastercard, along with legendary cricketer Mahendra Singh Dhoni, today announced the launch of a nationwide initiative to accelerate the acceptance and adoption of digital payments. Titled ‘Team Cashless India’, the initiative brings consumers and merchants to the forefront of the digital payments dialogue. The campaign encourages all Indians to nominate one or more merchants who currently do not accept digital payments. Mastercard will work together with Confederation of All India Traders (CAIT), acquirer banks and fintech companies to support nominated merchants to deploy digital payments acceptance infrastructure.

The initiative is in line with Mastercard’s endeavor to create an ecosystem which encourages people to use digital payments for their day-to-day purchases. To take part in ‘Team Cashless India’, anyone can either nominate merchants online or give a missed call to 9016861000. Mastercard will also conduct an outreach program across multiple cities to educate merchants on the benefits of accepting digital payments and to provide a platform for consumers to nominate merchants. These nominations are expected to create a social movement for making India a cashless society. To garner support for the movement, M.S. Dhoni will interact with merchants and encourage them to 'bat' for a cashless India by accepting digital payments. Mastercard will provide select nominated merchants and consumers with a chance to join Mahendra Singh Dhoni’s Team Cashless India.

The government has been actively promoting digital payments to make digital inclusion the cornerstone of the economy and hence, has taken several initiatives for the promotion of a less-cash economy. To make this a success, the acceptance of digital payment infrastructure is of paramount importance and India will need roughly 25-30 million acceptance locations by the end of 2021. Digital payments benefit small merchants in several ways, such as lower cost of managing cash, safety and security of money and credit history that opens avenues for more business.

In line with the Government’s vision, ‘Team Cashless India’ is an important step towards Mastercard’s goal to equip 10 million merchants in India with digital payments acceptance capabilities by 2020. The active involvement of cricketing legend Mahendra Singh Dhoni will provide the necessary impetus to the cash-to-digital conversation while CAIT, with its extensive network of over 70 million merchants and traders, will provide the necessary scale and reach via on-the-ground outreach to merchants. Partner banks and payment facilitators will work with merchants to install digital payments infrastructure at points of sale.

Elaborating on the initiative, Ari Sarker, Co-President, Asia Pacific, Mastercard said, “Over the years, Mastercard has invested continuously and worked tirelessly to strengthen acceptance of digital payments amongst merchants, especially those in tier 2 and 3 cities, as they are the real drivers of India’s economic growth. This exciting initiative brings together Mastercard’s commitment to Digital India and Mahendra Singh Dhoni’s representation of a progressive ‘Bharat’. Mastercard believes Team Cashless India will play a vital role in engaging consumers and merchants to propel India’s transformation as a cashless economy.”

Over the last few years, digital payments in India have grown substantially. In FY19, the country registered 31.34 billion retail digital payments. Further, the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MeitY) has set a target of 40 billion digital transactions for FY 20.

However, around 90 percent retail payments are still in cash. This represents a massive opportunity for transformation beyond the metropolitan cities. Mastercard has been continuously working with partner banks, CAIT, and fintech companies to enhance awareness and adoption of digital payments. This has resulted in training workshops for merchants, low-cost acceptance solutions for small merchants, and educational advertising campaigns that have led to higher awareness and perception change.