On Budget table: new fund, portals to push card payments

CREATION OF an Acceptance Development Fund (ADF) to encourage wider card payment infrastructure,amendmentstogovernment rules to include digital modes of payment alongside other modes of payment, and the development of new portals by tax bodies to collect tax payments digitally are likely to figure in a package aimed at promoting electronic payment modes in the Union Budget for 2017-18.

The ADF, to be mainly driven The government is also considering options to either set up a new payments regulator or to make the current Board for Regulation and Supervision of Payment and Settlement Systems (BPSS) within RBI more independent.

These measures, some of which are based on recommendations of a committee headed by former Finance Secretary Ratan Watal, are likely to be announced in the Union Budget 2017-18. “We have held discussions with heads of banks to set up the development fund. A number of other steps have