India’s own homegrown card network RuPay has become the biggest market player with over 459 million transactions constituting more than half of total transactions being made in India. Rupay became the largest payment card network overtaking VISA in June last year when it touched the base of 375 million transactions.

Till May 2018, transaction through RuPay card increased to Rs 2,347 crore from Rs 1,929 crore at the end of March 2018, news agency. RuPay cards can be used at 1.45 lakhs ATMs, 26.14 lakhs POS terminals and various e-commerce websites across India.

The reason behind RuPay’s success could also be the lower processing fee. Transactions carried through RuPay attract 23% lesser processing fee than Visa and Mastercard.

Moreover, the card is presently accepted at 39 PSU and private banks 39 banks. Recently, the Goods and Services Tax (GST) Council cashback up to Rs 100 on digital payments through Rupay card and BHIM app on a pilot basis to promote cashless transactions.

The success of RuPay could be also be attributed to Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s involvement in promoting the payments card network. In June this year, he had urged people to use RuPay saying that the earning from its transactions will remain in India, while others’ earnings will go abroad.

“Those who talk about patriotism, everyone cannot go to the border for the security of the nation. We can serve the nation through RuPay card as well. If you develop a habit of using RuPay card…that will also become a medium to serve the nation,” PTI reported Modi as saying.

To this, competitor Mastercard has made an objection in the United States saying that Modi was using nationalism to promote the use of a domestic payments network, thus stifling its growth in India.