Niti Aayog offers Rs 1cr lottery on making digital payments

New Delhi: After Arun Jaitley-led Finance Ministry launched several lucrative incentives for users on making digital payments, the Niti Aayog on Thursday declared numerous awards for people who will make payments using digital means.

The Niti Aayog's CEO Amitabh Kant made the announcements in a press conference in the national capital on Thursday.

• 15,000 winners will be awarded Rs 1,000 each for 100 days. The scheme will begin on December 25, 2016 and will come to an end on April 14, 2017.
• On a weekly basis, 7,000 lucky winners will be awarded a maximum prize of Rs 1 lakh each for consumers and maximum award of Rs 50,000 each for merchants.
• A grand award of Rs 1 crore will also be given to one lucky winner among the consumers on April 14. The second prize will be of Rs 50 lakh and the third prize winner would get Rs 25 lakh.
• The scheme, however, will not cover transactions of more than Rs 5000 and less than Rs 50.
• The scheme will also not cover business to business transactions.
• The scheme would only cover transactions made through RuPay, USSD, UPI and AEPS, while payments made using credit cards and e-wallets won't be considered.

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Earlier, the finance ministry declared discounts on fuel and highway toll while insurance on railway tickets on making digital payments.

The Centre is facing flak from the Opposition over its November 8 decision of scrapping high denomination currency notes of Rs 500 and Rs 1,000, which they claimed that would curb corruption and eradicate black money.

Also Read: Govt. announces smart discounts on online payments

During the past few weeks, Prime Minister Narendra Modi has been appealing people to use digital mediums to make the payments while shopping as it would help the government in creating a 'cashless economy'.