Bill Gates hails India’s digital finance approach, calls it 'global model'

Microsoft co-founder and billionaire philanthropist Bill Gates on Tuesday hailed India’s policies for financial invation and inclusion and said that based on its approach to policy implementation, his philanthropic foundation is working with or countries to roll out open-source techlogies.

Gates ackwledged that India has built ambitious platforms for universal identification and digital payments, including world’s largest biometric database (Ahaar) and a system for cash transactions between any bank or smartphone app (UPI). He said se policies have drastically reduced cost and friction of distributing aid to poor, especially during pandemic.

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Speaking at Singapore Fintech Festival, Gates said if people are looking to study one country right w, or than China, y should look at India, where “things really exploding and invation around that system is phemenal.”

Indian digital payments method was launched after government demonetized its currencies in 2016, invalidating most of its high-value banktes, in order to curb corruption and push Indians away from cash. Unified Payments Interface (UPI) is aided by booming smartphone use and lowest wireless data rates in world. India mandates companies to use its UPI platform for easy flow of payments among all services, including Facebook Inc., Amazon.com Inc., Walmart Inc., Paytm and any new start-up.

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'India, a great example to world'

Praising India as a “great example,” Gates said his organization is w helping some countries that don’t have established standards to roll out similar systems based on open-source techlogies. Countries such as Russia, Morocco and Banglesh have expressed interest in India’s biometric system - Ahaar.

Speaking on ‘significant accomplishment’ in development of vaccines against Coronavirus, Gates said at least six treatments are expected to be available in first quarter of next year.

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Gates stressed need to dress virus in an equitable way, that is why, his foundation is working with global manufacturers, including Serum Institute in India, to ensure availability of sufficient doses at reasonable prices. Gates said he expects vaccines to put an end to pandemic in 2022, but also warned against complacency.

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