RuPay: India’s Own Card Brand

There are 225 Million ATM cards in India, of which 90 Million are from a single Bank- State Bank of India, 0.55 Million merchants have PoS machines, Rs 3000 Crore is being dispatched every day from ATM machines. We are using American Branded Visa and Master Cards for all these. How much money they are making from giving their technology and brand name? How many personal data is getting transferred to them every day? So there comes an idea of India’s own card brand- RuPay.

NPCI- National Payment Corporation of India is a section 25 non profit organization formed by RBI and other Indian Banks. To bring the competition in cards, reduce the cost of card payments and card issuance and most importantly to secure the data within the nation NPCI has brought its own brand of card called RuPay. Already 12 co-operative banks and Regional Rural Banks are using the RuPay ATM cards, which can be used to withdraw cash from ATMs. By the end of March 2012, debit card will be launched using the flat form of Axis Bank and SBI as acquirer (bank to which PoS machines belongs to) and issuer of cards and Union Bank of India and Bank of India as card issuer. RuPay card holder can do shopping by April 2012. It will be ready for online transactions i.e. ecommerce by June 2012.

Apart from the main stream card business RuPay is also concentrating on financial inclusion. Adhar enabled biometric cards are being issued in Jarkhand by Axis Bank, Bank of India and SBI. RBI has given permission to 18 prepaid card service provider to issue prepaid cards with easy KYC to non bank customers and migrant labours.

RuPay will not be just an domestic card. RuPay has tie up with Discover Cards which is a neutral player for Indian market and 3rd largest card issuer (Visa and Master occupy first two positions and Amex occupy the position next to Discover. RuPay cost is 50% lesser than the Visa and Master cards which are dominating Indian market.

Also read A cashless life to come soon! about the mobile payment system developed by NCPI.

Rajiv Gandhi and his relationships with KGB!

The base for this heading is a book called ‘The State Within A State: The KGB and its hold on Russia - Past, Present and Future’. This book is written by Dr. Yevgenia Markovna Albats, a famous Russian investigative journalist, chief editor of The New Times magazine.

The page No 223 of the book is very important for us, the Indians. It exposes the former Prime Minister Mr. Rajiv Gandhi and boosts the arguments that Mrs Antonio Maino aka Sonia Gandhi’s relationships with the KGB. The author writes “A letter signed by Viktor Chebrikov, who replaced Andropov as the KGB head in 1982 noted: "the USSR KGB maintains contact with the son of the Premier Minister Rajiv Gandhi [of India] ... R Gandhi expresses deep gratitude for the benefits accruing to the Prime Minister's family from the commercial dealings of the firm he controls in co-operation with the Soviet foreign trade organisations. R Gandhi reports confidentially that a substantial portion of the funds obtained through this channel are used to support the party of R Gandhi.” She does not simply writes these words, she gives the reference for this at page No. 380 as ‘25. KGB Archive f 5 op. 6. por. No. 12. D. 131. t. 1 1.d 103-104.’

She cited KGB notes describing "commercial dealings" of Rajiv Gandhi's family with Soviet foreign trade. She tells Rajiv Gandhi and his party were been paid by a Russian Company. It is well-known that there was Sonia Gandhi’s hand in every Indo—Soviet trade deal and defence purchases. That’s why Gandhi family needed Swiss Bank accounts. Obviously the person who brought Rajiv Gandhi to KGB contact is his girl fried then his wife Sonia Gandhi. She was also alleged to be the member of KGB and been appointed to trap Rajiv Gandhi.

It is not a new finding for the Indian Media. Times of India (June 27, 1992) and Hindu (July 4, 1992) reported regarding receipt of payments from KGB by Rajiv Gandhi and his family. I don’t think Mrs Albats’ book and her citation can be a cooked up story. Another reason to believe Mrs Albats is she was an official member of the Soviet government’s KGB Commission and had access to many KGB documents. Even Indian government can now obtain the copies of these documents.But nobody is raising their voice expect Subramanian Swamy of Janata Party. It is shameful for Indians to have people who have/had the relationship with the foreign spy agencies at the top positions of the country.

What’s Right Isn’t Always Popular…

I was going through an online course developed by my organisation on decision making and found this story very interesting on making decision. I'm giving it as it is I found somewhere in the internet.

A few children were playing on two railway tracks, one still in use while the other disused. Only one child played on the track not in use, the rest on the operational track. The train is coming, and you are just beside the track interchange. You can make the train change its course to the disused track and save most of the kids. However, that would also mean the lone child playing by the disused track would be sacrificed. Or would you rather let the train go its way? Also remember that you don't have time to inform either the children playing there or the locomotive pilot to stop the train. You have to choose from the only above two option.

Before going further please take a pause, make your answer ready.

Let us see the decision you took is right or not.

If you have taken the decision to divert the train to unused track, to save most of the children at the expense of only one child you have definitely taken a popular decision as most of others take.

But, have you ever thought that the child choosing to play on the disused track had in fact made the right decision to play at a safe place? Why should he had to be sacrificed because of his ignorant friends who chose to play where the danger was? The kids playing on the operational track should have known very well that track was still in use, and that they should have run away if they heard the train's sirens. If the train was diverted, that lone child would definitely die because he never thought the train could come over to that track! Moreover, that track was not in use probably because it was not safe. If the train was diverted to the track, we could put the lives of all passengers on board at stake! And in your attempt to save a few kids by sacrificing one child, you might end up sacrificing hundreds of people to save these few ignorant kids.

"Remember that what's right isn't always popular and what's popular isn't always right."