The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) has asked payment companies to send it fortnightly updates on the progress made on storage of payment system data in India, said T.R. Ramachandran, group country manager for India and South Asia, Visa. The Central bank mandated in April that all payments system operators working in India to ensure that data related to payment systems operated by them is stored in the country. The move would have come into effect from October 15 this year. According to Ramachandran, the central bank’s April circular had directed all concerned entities to update it every 15 days, but we could not find any reference to the fortnightly updates in the central bank’s notice. However, an executive of an international financial institution operating in India has told MediaNama that the central bank did ask for periodical updates. “I’m not absolutely certain if this was made public but, RBI had asked us to give regular updates soon after the policy (in April),” the official said on the condition of anonymity. More importantly, the official said that it is ‘next to impossible’ for most payment companies to transfer all user related data to the country by October. “I don’t know if some smaller companies will pull it off but, for major institutions, its impossible to do this in six months. We are no where close to completing the process,” he said. When asked if Visa will adhere to RBI’s deadline, Ramachandran said, “Who knows? These are very, very complex projects. Different companies…
