The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) plans to enhance the scope of its digital rupee trials by introducing new features and use cases for both retail and wholesale central bank digital currencies (CBDCs), as outlined in the central bank's 2024–25 Annual Report. The RBI aims to explore programmability and offline capabilities for the digital rupee to make it more versatile in areas with limited internet access, catering to specific needs like government subsidies and corporate spending controls. Currently, pilot testing is underway for both versions of the CBDC, with the retail pilot involving 600,000 users across 17 banks and the wholesale pilot targeting the interbank market. The report also highlights significant growth in digital payments in India during the financial year 2024–25, with the Unified Payments Interface (UPI) leading global real-time payments. Additionally, innovative features like 'Delegated Payments' have been introduced to expand the benefits of digital payments to a wider audience. Despite regulatory challenges, India continues to see a rise in digital asset holders, with over 100 million estimated in a population of 1.4 billion. Read more AI-generated news on: https://app.chaingpt.org/news

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