India's retail giant Reliance becomes first to accept Digital Rupee

Reliance Retail will be the first company to accept retail payments in Digital Rupee at all outlets. The retailer offered the first in-store acceptance of the currency at Freshpik Shop, following which the policy will be extended across all stores.

The company has partnered with Kotak Mahindra, Innoviti Technologies, and ICICI Bank to enable the acceptance of the digital rupee. If any customer is interested in paying through CBDC or digital rupee, then you can scan a QR code and make the payment.

Reliance Retail will be accepting digital rupee across 17,000 stores across 7,000 cities in the country.

When was the Digital Rupee launched?

The Reserve Bank of India had first launched the digital rupee in the retail market in some cities on December 1, 2022. Initially, it was launched in Mumbai, New Delhi, Bengaluru, and Bhubaneswar, but it was later launched in more cities. In the pilot stage of the project, eight banks, including ICICI Bank and Kotak Mahindra Bank, participated.

Digital Rupee features

The digital rupee retail has features like convenience and security and it also offers person to person(P2P) and person to merchant (P2M) transactions. The clients of these banks will be able to conduct the transactions using a digital wallet.