Maldives launches India’s RuPay card: a milestone in cross-border banking
With this initiative, the Bank of Maldives (BML) will join over 1,100 banks worldwide that issue RuPay cards.
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In a significant step toward enhancing the banking system and facilitating cross-border transactions, the Maldives launched India's RuPay card on October 7th, 2024. RuPay is the first of its kind global card payment network in India, which is widely accepted at ATMs, POS devices and e-commerce websites across India. With a name that emphasizes that it is India’s very own initiative for card payments, RuPay is India’s answer to international payment networks.
With this initiative, the Bank of Maldives (BML) will join over 1,100 banks worldwide that issue RuPay cards. As BML announced that it has now begun accepting RuPay cards on its ATMs and POS terminals, this is a major step forward for the Maldives’ banking system as thousands of tourists from India visit the Maldives annually. Used by more than 300 million users worldwide, the payment system was introduced to the Maldives under India’s Unified Payment Interface (UPI).
India is a key trading partner for Maldives and the RuPay card service will facilitate financial transactions between the two countries and further expand trade with India, especially for small and medium enterprises.
The card service which was launched may be the first step towards facilitating an easier banking system between India and the Maldives. While RuPay has a promising future to take the banking system to the next level, the service is currently only available to Indian nationals.
