• Nagaraju Maddirala made the comments while chairing a meeting with top executives and cofounders of major fintech startups
• The meeting was attended by the likes of CRED founder Kunal Shah, Bipin Preet Singh of MobiKwik, Google Pay's Sharath Bulusu, among others
• The secretary underscored the need for further improving digital payment systems in rural and North-Eastern regions, particularly through UPI

On Tuesday, January 7, Nagaraju Maddirala, Secretary of the Department of Financial Services (DFS), urged fintech startups to consistently deliver innovative solutions to the financial services sector while strictly adhering to regulations.

Maddirala made these remarks during a meeting in New Delhi with top executives and co-founders of leading fintech startups, including Kunal Shah of CRED, Bipin Preet Singh of MobiKwik, Sharath Bulusu from Google Pay, as well as representatives from BillDesk, Infibeam Avenues, and Razorpay. Industry bodies like the Startup Policy Forum, Payments Council of India, and Digital Lenders Association of India also participated in the meeting.

“The engagement with partners from the startup and fintech ecosystem aimed at fostering an open exchange of ideas to raise the fintech sector to a global standard,” an official statement noted.

Praising the rapid growth of India’s fintech sector over the past decade, Maddirala emphasized the need to enhance digital payment systems in rural and North-Eastern regions, especially through UPI. He also encouraged stakeholders to promote "lending based on digital footprints" to support micro, small, and medium enterprises (MSMEs).

The official statement highlighted the various initiatives introduced by the Centre to create a conducive environment for the fintech sector's growth.

The meeting also saw participation from officials from the Reserve Bank of India (RBI), the National Payments Corporation of India (NPCI), the Financial Intelligence Unit (FIU), and the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MeitY).

This meeting comes at a time when India's fintech ecosystem is facing the challenges of a funding slowdown. Despite being the most funded sector in the previous year, Indian fintech ventures raised $2.5 billion in 2024, marking a 19% decline from $3.1 billion in 2023. This decline represents the third consecutive year of reduced funding for the fintech sector.

However, the industry saw a 23% increase in the total number of deals, which rose from 132 in 2023 to 162 in 2024. The sector also crossed the $30 billion funding milestone between 2014 and 2024 and added two new unicorns: Moneyview and Perfios.

Noteworthy deals in 2024 included investments in companies such as Finova Capital, Drip Capital, and M2P, all of which secured funding exceeding $100 million.