UPI charges row: Chidambaram among 5 Congress MPs who had backed revenue framework

As Congress MPs P Chidambaram, Manish Tewari, Gaurav Gogoi, Kishori Lal and K Gopinath joined forces in a Standing Committee on Finance report, they called for a tiered Merchant Discount Rate (MDR) or revenue framework to ensure the Unified Payments Interface (UPI) ecosystem's long-term financial sustainability. The Committee, chaired by BJP MP Bhartruhari Mahtab, stated that while the government's current incentive covers only 11% of industry costs and 14% of potential MDR collections, establishing a viable revenue mechanism is critical to avoid perpetually straining the government exchequer.

The report emphasized that a tiered MDR framework, when notified and operationalized without delay, would allow payment service providers to invest in cybersecurity, fraud prevention, and network infrastructure.