Are You Also Seeing an Spike in Fraudulent Messages?
In light of so many scam messages riding on re-KYC, PAN update etc to dupe the customer, here is a lesson I learned while working for HDFC Bank. I was responsible for ensuring migration of all the cards from CBoP systems to HDFC Bank systems. After careful consideration I prepared 3 possible strategies and presented…
Myths About Our Ancient Epics
Watch me here in conversation with Anuj Upadhyaya, talking about myths related to our ancients epics Mahabharat and Ramayan and how to counter them.
Brahmāstra: Part One – Shiva Review
The movie starts with the backstory of Infinity Stones and how powerful they are. It explains how a society of sorcerers was appointed to protect these stones from falling into wrong hands. Oops, wrong movie. The backstory is about the various astra which can harness the powers of various elements and animals. The most powerful…
Shamshera – Review
It’s been a while since I have written review for any movie but yesterday I watched a movie so atrocious that it compelled me to find time from my schedule to write about it. I have seen many bad movies in the past but it is very rare that any movie has made me feel…
Why did I decide to build Sutradhar?
I started working on building my start-up Sutradhar almost a year back. Not a single day has passed when people have not asked me, “why I chose to create Sutradhar and not some fintech?” Not an unexpected question, considering I have been a part of banking and fintech ecosystem in varying capacity for good 15…
Making UPI Safer
I recently came across NPCI PayAuth Challenge, seeking proposals to improve UPI authentication process to enhance user experience and improved security. I thought this is a good reason to write a new blogpost. I have been a big advocate of risk based authentication and believe that it clearly has the potential significantly improve the authentication…
Building Sutradhar
For last one year I have been busy building Sutradhar. It’s a platform for stories from Bhartiya Itihas and Mythology. Our ancient literature and oral folklore tradition is extremely rich and full of entertaining stories. At Sutradhar we are attempting to bring these stories to limelight by delivering them to your mobile phone. I urge…
Conversation with a fraudster: Apparently I won an SUV on some Amazon Prime Lottery
Had the most amazing conversation just now. Brace yourself and read this: Received a call from an unknown number telling me I have won lucky draw of Amazon company and have won a Tata Safari. The generous caller gave me two options, either opt for the car or get the cash equivalent to the value…
Candid Chat with Gaurav Tripathi of Superpro.ai
Here is the recording of the Fireside chat with Gaurav Tripathi, recorded on 28th Nov, 2020. Hope this is useful for people following this blog.
ProTalks : Fireside Chat with Gaurav Tripathi
Join the Fireside Chat featuring Gaurav Tiwari, the founder of Sutradhar which is building an ecosystem to support storytellers focused on telling stories from Indian mythology and ancient history, legends and folklores.Earlier he held senior roles at various banks with a focus on FinTech products and investments. Protalks is a series hosted by Gaurav Tripathi…
What Did I Learn in IIT?
I am often asked this question, specially in the context that my career choice has nothing do with my B.Tech. degree. I feel like recounting some of my experiences from my IIT life, which taught me a great deal and played a key role in shaping me as a person and have directly or indirectly…
Supporting Offline Transactions
In a recent communication RBI has pointed out the need for supporting digital transactions in offline mode in order to overcome the handicap of “lack of stable connectivity” as a hindrance to digital adoption. I thought it is a good time to talk about offline authorization, when it comes to processing payment transactions. Some definitions…
My IIT JEE Preparation Story
How a sixteen year old me navigated through coaching classes in Kanpur with almost no money to prepare for IIT JEE and managed to sail through in my first attempt. I prepared this on request of my friends from ExtraClass to help their students in these uncertain times. Hopefully this will motivate kids preparing themselves…
Decoding CRED : Part 2
There is nothing unique about acquiring customers by offering something extra for free, even our vegetable vendors have been doing this for ages. This is the reason he throws in those extra curry leaves in your bag whenever you buy vegetables from him. How often though have you seen a vegetable vendor giving away curry…
Thoughts on Product Management
While I rarely held the title of Product Manager, I spent most of my career as one. During my stints as part of Business Solutions Group in Banks, my role usually was to design solutions for the concepts raised by product or operations teams. I still took it upon myself to launch various initiatives on…
Decoding CRED
CRED is one start-up, which has been getting a lot of media attention since it was launched by its charismatic founder, who in his previous avatar founded a very interesting start-up and gave a massive exit to his investors, when that start-up got acquired by Snapdeal. VC world loves a successful exit, for very obvious…
How Does FASTag Work?
FASTag is part of NETC (National Electronic Toll Collection) program by NPCI designed to provide an interoperable method of toll collection across the country irrespective of the acquirer, simple meaning that your FASTag device issued by any issuer will work on any toll plaza across the country irrespective of its acquirer. That is the benefit…
Even more thoughts on MDR debate
In my last post I had touched upon the entire authorization piece for card transactions and how it makes sense to have MDR for Credit Card transactions however it feels unreasonable when it come to Debit Card transactions. Today I will explain the settlement aspect of transaction and try to make sense of MDR charges…
More Thoughts on MDR Debate
So much chatter going on in Indian market around MDR, short for Merchant Discount Rate, thanks to NPCI making MDR zero for RuPay debit card transaction based on instructions from Finance Ministry. I had touched upon this topic once before here. However now coronavirus pandemic putting extra pressure on most of the businesses including payment…
Facebook Acquired Minority Stake in Jio – My Views
First thing I came to know in the morning today, after I managed to figure out it was actually morning and not afternoon, was that Facebook has acquired 9.99% stake in Jio; making them the largest minority stake holder in Jio. Afterwords I spent the entire day reading tweets and news reports talking about how…
Google Debit Card
Recently I came across news stories covering Google’s plan to launch a Debit Card. It all started with this TechCrunch article comparing this move with Apple Card launch. First of all, to me that is not a fair comparison to begin with because Credit and Debit card are two fundamentally different products at their core.…
Why this is the best time for early stage investors?
Few years back I had no idea about how investing works. In 2012, when I was first toying with the idea of becoming an entrepreneur I did not even have a clue how venture investing works. Then I got a chance to run an accelerator for early stage Fintech start-ups for some time with investment…
Banking Industry’s Response to RBI’s Moratorium on Loan Deferment Proposal
Follow up to earlier post clarifying RBI’s loan deferment memorandum, this post by @bhartiya_abhi summarizes the response of leading banks. Presenting the summary and analysis of the response of 7 banks of India (SBI, ICICI, HDFC, PNB HSBC, Citibank and Standard Chartered) in response to RBI deferment option. While each bank has a separate policy…
RBI Loan Deferment (take it or leave it)
RBI has recently announced deferment option to financial institutions for 3months to fight the challenges arising due to the pandemic (Covid 19). This announcement is a welcome step to fight the sudden financial uncertainties faced by retail borrowers. While many people will grab this opportunity due to financial problems it has also increased confusion amongst…
Concept Note: Coronavirus tracking app
Google Location is one of the most widely used service in the world and most of the smartphones have this service on by default for it is also being used by various other utility applications worldwide. We also know that google maintains the history unless a user specifically requests to delete that history. Google also…
Fintech in the time of Coronavirus
We are now living in the time of highly contagious COVID19 caused by novel Coronavirus infection. Since there is still no vaccine or cure for this the only way being recommended to control the spread of this disease is social distancing. This means everyone is requested to stay at home unless absolutely necessary and avoid…
Transit Payments
Coronavirus (COVID19) has made us all conscious about avoiding unnecessary human contact to protect oneself from getting infected. This made many people think about how cash can be one of the careers. I am not familiar with the biology of the virus and how exactly this transmission would work. However if people are worried about…
Sahamati and Account Aggregator Ecosystem
First time I became aware of the consent layer iSPIRT was working on was sometime around late 2016, when my then boss (who happened to meet Nandan during some event they both attended and heard about it from him), asked my keep my eyes on it because this is going to be something really big…
Co-branded Cards: Can It Go Beyond Branding
I had come across multiple news items regarding various co-branded cards like RBL Bank launching co-branded card with Zomato and HDFC Bank launching co-branded cards with Indigo Airlines. These stories prompted me into writing down my thoughts on this very popular product category among payment cards. During my days in Banks I had worked on…
Phone pe Loan or Loan pe Phone
These days every other Fintech struggling to find a sustainable revenue model is trying to become a lending company. While the bigger ones with enough capital are going with their own NBFC, smaller players are using credit lines from other NBFCs. However even when these start-ups are using credit line they end up offering FLDG…
UPI for Cash Transactions
Recently two news items hit the round, one with PhonePe launching ATM services through their merchant partners and another with NPCI releasing guidelines for cash withdrawal at local retailers on the lines of Cash at POS model. How this transaction works will be easy to understand once we know that the accounting for Cash Withdrawal…
How will UPI based payments app make money?
I have come across multiple articles highlighting how after abolition of PSP fees for UPI transactions, there will be no way for UPI apps like Google Pay, PhonePe etc, to make money. I tried to do some thinking on this subject and will try to present my thought process here. The purpose with which UPI…
डिजिटल भुगतान: कार्ड पेमेंट (पार्ट-४): धोखाधड़ी की रोकथाम
यह कार्ड भुगतान पर मेरी श्रृंखला का अंतिम भाग है और इस पोस्ट में मैं कार्ड उपभोक्ताओं को लक्षित कुछ आम धोखाधड़ी के तरीकों को कवर करने की कोशिश करूँगा। हम यह भी देखेंगे कि आप इन सबसे अपनी रक्षा कैसे कर सकते हैं। स्किमिंग: लेनदेन के समय आपके कार्ड की जानकारी चुराने और फिर…
डिजिटल भुगतान: कार्ड पेमेंट (पार्ट-३): सुरक्षा
कार्ड भुगतान पारिस्थितिक तंत्र को उसके पूरे वैल्यू-चेन में शामिल विभिन्न पक्षों की सुरक्षा की दृष्टिकोण से डिज़ाइन किया गया है। मैं अपने “डिजिटल भुगतान” (पेमेंट) सीरीज में इस लेख को इन सुरक्षा उपायों के ऊपर केंद्रित करना चाहूंगा ताकि उपभोक्ता इसकी जानकारी रख सकें। कार्ड भुगतान से सम्बंधित हर इकाई, सिस्टम और प्रक्रिया को…
Thoughts on RBI Draft Paper on NUE for Retail Payment Systems
On 10th Feb, 2020 Reserve Bank of India released a paper on ‘draft framework for authorisation of a pan-India New Umbrella Entity (NUE) for Retail Payment Systems’ for public comments. RBI has invited comments from all stakeholders by February 25th, 2020. In 2005, when I had started my career from HDFC Bank, there were multiple…
WhatsApp Pay: A Prediction
Finally after wait of many months NPCI has given go ahead to Facebook to launch their UPI based WhatsApp Pay service. I had used their service when they had launched their pilot last year and found the user experience super efficient for P2P payments. On multiple occasions we used this method to pay to or…
Why do I think Zero MDR is a good move?
Imagine a scenario without banks, everyone earns and spends in cash. There are no charges to be paid to anyone. If you are supposed to earn 100 Rs for a service offered, you would earn 100 Rs and when you purchase an item or service worth 100 Rs, you would pay 100 Rs for the…
कार्ड पेमेंट की परिभाषा सरल हिंदी में
जब आप अपने डेबिट, क्रेडिट या फिर प्रीपेड कार्ड का इश्तेमाल करते हैं तो कई कंपनियां इस पूरे चक्र में मिलकर काम करती हैं। पहले तो आपको कार्ड देने वाली बैंक जिसे इस्सुअर बैंक, दुकानदार के यहाँ कार्ड चलाने का मशीन या QR कोड देने वाला बैंक जिसे एक्विरिंग बैंक और इन दोनों बैंकों के…
Payments Explained: UPI Part 1 (Terminology)
UPI stands for Unified Payments Interface. It’s a system created by NPCI (National Payments Corporation of India) to enable various forms of payments like peer to peer (p2p), merchant payments (p2m) using bank accounts through mobile phone. With increasing adoption of mobile phone there was a need to enable a mobile native payments method that…
Payments Explained: Card Transactions Part 4 (Fraud Prevention)
This is the last part of my series on card payments and in this post I will try to cover some common frauds targeting card users and how one can best protect herself/himself against those. Skimming: Skimming is the process of stealing your card information at the time of interaction and then misusing that information…
Payments Explained: Card Transactions Part 3 (Protection)
Card payments ecosystem has been designed with safeguards at various stages to ensure protection of various parties involved in the value chain. I would like to dedicate this post to list down these safeguards to make users familiar with them. Every entity, system and process handling card information needs to adhere to Data Security Standards…
Payments Explained: Card Transactions Part 2 (Transaction Flow)
Continuing from my last post dedicated towards explaining the common terminology used in payments world in terms of the participants and instruments, in this post I will focus on how a card transaction works. Back in 2005, after completing my B.Tech. in Mechanical Engineering, during my job interview with HDFC Bank, my super boss (then…
Payments Explained: Card Transactions Part 1 (Terminology)
Payments is the most popular service used by the widest customer base. Everyone recognizes some of the key players operating in the space like Banks (Issuers and Acquirers), Visa, MasterCard, NPCI (Interchanges) by virtue of seeing there logos at every ATM and merchant outlets and also on the face of their cards (Credit, Debit, Prepaid).…
Blockchain: A sample case for how it can affect your life
Before there were banks, people used to trade by exchanging goods of value between themselves. This system was not scale-able due to the logistics involved. To solve this problem states came up with currency, which was issued by the state and value of the currency was guaranteed by the state. Primary form for these currencies…
Financial Inclusion: Past, Present and Future A Technology View
The biggest challenge to financial inclusion situation is that most of the people attempting a solution don’t even have a clear view of the problem. When you solve the problem with clarity of vision, you end up creating an institution like Bandhan Bank and in other cases you end up installing ATM machines in villages,…
BharatQR: Untapped Potential or Lost Opportunity
Officially launched on Feb,2017; BharatQR is world’s first interoperable and low cost acceptance solution, developed by National Payments Corporation of India (NPCI), Mastercard, and Visa. BharatQR was devised based on the direction set by the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) in September 2016 and its Payments Vision 2018, which outlines innovation, interoperability, and security as…
State of Fintech in India
Introduction First thing first, “what is Fintech?” Well, my definition is very simple, “a financial services organization that runs their builds and manages their own technology stack. Specially the components that are mission critical for their business.” Why is this an advantage? Almost all the incumbents rely on outsourcing or licensing technology from various technology…
About Me
I was born in a very small village in Uttar Pradesh, the population of which is in four digits and I still cannot locate it in Google maps. After spending six years there, I moved on to a small town called Jahanabad and studied there till 5th standard and then moved to Kanpur to live…
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