NPCI to Build 5 Lakh Sq Ft HQ in Mumbai's BKC

Mumbai, Feb 28 (PTI) The National Payments Corporation of India is looking to create a 5 lakh sq ft space in the Bandra Kurla Complex business district, a top official said on Friday.

Its chief executive Dilip Asbe said the building will be able to accommodate about 5,000 people and will take about three years to build.

The body, which handles a bulk of the payments system in the country including the very popular UPI and NEFT, has a rented place in BKC acting as its headquarters and two other offices in suburban Jogeshwari and Goregaon.

There will also be consolidation of staff into the headquarters, Asbe said, adding that about 1,000 employees of NPCI's over 2,000 employees are based in the city.

He said the work being done on artificial intelligence will make it pertinent to have more seats, for which the new facility will be useful.

It can be noted that in October last year, the Mumbai Metropolitan Region Development Authority had allotted a commercial plot in BKC, which also houses offices or headquarters of Sebi, SBI, ICICI Bank, Citibank and a host of other financial sector entities.

Meanwhile, Asbe said that the credit on Unified Payments Interface (UPI) platform is growing very fast, and pointed out that about 8 per cent of the overall credit card spends are going through the NPCI-operated platform.

The Rupay gateway accounts for 16 per cent of the spends on credit cards, and half of them are happening through the UPI platform, he said.