UPI outage: Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman asks NPCI and all other stakeholders to work ...

Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman called for collective action to bridge infrastructure gaps and achieve one billion daily UPI transactions within 2-3 years during a review meeting prompted by recent UPI outages. Users faced transaction failures on March 26, April 2, and April 12, marking the third disruption in under two weeks.
Sitharaman directed NPCI to bolster UPI’s reliability, enhance user experience, and strengthen cybersecurity to prevent future disruptions. She emphasized expanding UPI’s global reach through interoperable frameworks and increasing international payment acceptance, while also urging efforts to onboard more users and merchants. "FM Smt. @nsitharaman urged all stakeholders to work collaboratively to address infrastructure gaps, enhance the end-user experience and cybersecurity architecture. The Union Finance Minister directed @NPCI_NPCI to reinforce UPI's robustness and prevent future disruptions," the finance ministry said in a post on Twitter.
The meeting, reportedly attended by Finance Secretary Ajay Seth, Financial Services Secretary M Nagaraju, and NPCI CEO Dilip Asbe, focused on improving UPI’s resilience, scalability, and real-time monitoring to ensure seamless service and maintain user trust.
UPI has seen a 72% CAGR in transactions from 2019-20 to 2024-25. Between 2021-22 and 2024-25, 26 crore new users and 5.5 crore merchants joined, with 45 crore annually active users. In 2024-25, UPI recorded Rs 261 lakh crore in transactions (30% growth) and 18,586 crore transactions by volume (42% growth).