No UPI Day called off, then traders got the deferral

Update, 19 October 2026. The deferment these traders asked for was granted twelve days after this post. On 13 October 2026 NPCI's UPI and Services Steering Committee postponed the 0.4 percent MDR past Diwali, citing the festive season, with the new date to be notified separately. Reported by Entrackr, Inc42 and the Free Press Journal. So the first of the three demands below has been met, on timing. The other two, excluding merchant to merchant transactions and lifting the monthly receipt exemption from Rs 1 lakh to Rs 5 lakh, are still not reported as granted, and NPCI has not published revised categories or exemptions. The paragraphs below record what was and was not obtained at the 1 October meeting itself, and are left as written.

The No UPI Day protest called for 2 October is off. Inc42 reported on 1 October 2026 that the All India Mobile Retailers Association and the All India Consumer Products Distributors Federation withdrew it after representatives of 20 trade associations met finance minister Nirmala Sitharaman. The delegation was led by Praveen Khandelwal, who is both secretary general of the Confederation of All India Traders and a BJP member of Parliament from Chandni Chowk.

Read what was actually obtained. Inc42 quotes Khandelwal saying the finance minister assured that all issues would be considered with utmost seriousness, and that the call was withdrawn accordingly. That was the whole of it on the day. No rate change, no deferral, no carve out. Even the assurance reaches the record through the trader side rather than a government statement. The 0.4 per cent MDR on specified person to merchant UPI transactions above Rs 2,000, capped at Rs 300 from Rs 75,000 upward, was then due to commence on 15 October.

Three demands went in. Deferment ahead of the festive season. Merchant to merchant transactions kept outside the regime. The monthly receipt exemption lifted from Rs 1 lakh to Rs 5 lakh. Inc42 sources the first two to Economic Times and reports none of them as conceded.

Two of those change an operator’s own numbers. The exemption is a monthly receipt limit, so whether a small seller is in scope turns entirely on that figure, and the source does not define what counts toward it. The supplier side ask is larger. If merchant to merchant payments are not excluded, a brand paying a vendor above Rs 2,000 carries the cost as well as the brand collecting from shoppers. Settle it with your acquirer in writing and fold the answer into supplier payment terms and your payment gateway selection.

Timing is the sting, and the source is explicit that deferment was sought ahead of the festive season and heightened business activity. 15 October sits inside that window, not before it. Two further things worth holding. Inc42 notes the Supreme Court has declined to stay the framework for now while seeking responses from the Centre, the RBI and NPCI. And in August the Confederation of All India Traders was on record backing a nominal MDR on higher value UPI payments. The fight is over rate, timing and scope, not principle. Plan for a post-Diwali start on a date NPCI has not yet notified.