In March 2018, the number of debit cards increased to 861 million, with 5.6 million new cardholders, while a total of 37.48 million credit cards were in operation, with the addition of 0.55 million cards, according to the Reserve Bank of India. Between March 2017 and March 2018, India added some 7.68 million credit cards and 6.18 million debit cards. Card usage spiked during the months of November 2016, December 2016 and January 2017, following the demonetization of Rs 500 and Rs 1000 notes. The unavailability of cash forced cardholders to use them. But since February 2017, both debit card and credit card usage have been range-bound. In June 2017, debit cards were down by 86.2 million to 793.83 million, shaving off most of the increase that demonetization brought in. The number of transactions using credit cards grew by 20% year-on-year, while it increased by 17.6% for debit cards for the 12 month period ending March 2018. In March, the total number of transactions through credit cards were 127.3 million, while the figure for debit cards was 318.9 million. Total amount transacted through credit cards — which was Rs 44,308 crore in March 2018 — increased by 35% in the 12 month period ending March 2018. Amount transacted through debit cards went up by 17% during the same time. In March 2018, Rs 41,857 crore were transacted through debit cards. Note in the chart above that the amount transacted using debit cards had surpassed credit cards in November 2016,…
