New Delhi: French President Emmanuel Macron, while speaking at the AI Impact Summit, 2026 hailed the Unified Payments Interface(UPI) revolution in India and reiterated how it has transformed the lives of the common people in India in terms of ensuring a safe digital and financial ecosystem. Macron asserted that by invigorating a digital tool called UPI India has embarked on an incredible feat which no other nation has accomplished. Through UPI, India has indeed built a digital identity for its 1.4 billion population, President Macron further asserted.
UPI has transformed ordinary lives in India
At the AI Impact Summit 2026, French President Macron also illustrated how ordinary lives have been transformed with the UPI digital ecosystem. There has been a positive and progressive change in the lives of the common people of India as a result of the UPI revolution, President Macron added. He explained a personal anecdote to testify to the stellar impact of UPI among the Indian masses. “Ten years ago, a street vendor in Mumbai could not open a bank account—no address, no papers, no access. Today, the same vendor accepts payments on his phone instantly and for free from anyone in the country”, Macron expressed his fascination towards the way in which ordinary and middle-class lives have been transformed in India, as an impact of the growth of the digital ecosystem.
“India built something no other country has built — a digital identity for 1.4 billion people”, Macron further added. This is not the maiden time that the French President Macron has been astonished by the UPI revolution in India. In 2024, when the French President visited Jaipur, Rajasthan on the sidelines of the Republic Day celebrations, he was impressed as Prime Minister Narendra Modi made UPI payment through his phone for the tea seller in a local shop, outside Hawa Mahal. As President Macron was quite impressed, PM Modi explained to him the user-friendly features, accessibility and speed of transactions that is possible with the UPI payment system.
Today, UPI is accessible in more than 8 countries worldwide. Indian travellers can make swift, hassle-free payments even abroad. This includes Bhutan, Nepal, Sri Lanka, Mauritius, Singapore, the United Arab Emirates(UAE), etc. Even France has adopted the UPI ecosystem to benefit Indian travellers to the country. The plan was initiated in February 2024 and France became the first European country to adopt India’s UPI.
Indian students, businessmen, and other tourists in France can thus engage in seamless digital transactions as a result of India’s digital revolution and its goal to promote digital literacy and digital inclusion through state-of-the-art, user-friendly digital public infrastructure. UPI is thus emerging as a soft power tool of India in the global forum that acts as an inspiring model to other nations in the path of revolutionising digital public infrastructure.
