India began the transition to digital payments after the demonetization. The goal of digitization is to make basic financial services accessible to everybody, however, some undeserving people continue to live in remote areas outside the reach of financial services. The research looks at how newly licensed payment banks might engage with disadvantaged and migrant groups within the demographic pie to effectively achieve the inclusion goals of the Indian banking regulator. Financial inclusion is a significant step towards inclusive growth; thus, the article tries to explore how payment banks are facilitating the achievement of financial inclusion throughout the nation, with special reference to Paytm Payment Bank. The study uses descriptive and exploratory research design. The exploratory study is conducted using secondary data sources and the descriptive study is conducted using a well-structured questionnaire and statistical analysis was done to arrive at the results. Findings suggest that age, gender, occupation and educational qualification are associated with the preference to use payment banks and no association has been found between gender, age and educational qualification with the frequency of using Paytm Payment Bank. Results also reveal the positive and negative correlation between various variables. This study will assist numerous scholars and institutions in better understanding the meaning of payment banks and their role and contribution in financial inclusion.

Payment bank, financial inclusion, digital payments, digital economy, Paytm, e-wallets

Gupta, A., & Singhal, R. (2021). Impact of COVID-19 on digital payment services at towns and villages. IJCRT2106045 International Journal of Creative Research Thoughts (IJCRT).

Gupta, K. P., Manrai, R., & Goel, U. (2021). Analysing the factors that affect the adoption of payments bank services in India: An analytic hierarchy process approach. International Journal of Business Information Systems, 37(4), 522–543.

Kaur, J., Kaur, S., Syan, A. S., & Sharma, R. R. (2020). Factors influencing the adoption of payment banks in India using an extended TAM. Asia-Pacific Journal of Management Research and Innovation, 16(4), 309–321.

Kittu, R. S., & Chittawadagi, S. M. B. (2019). Role of Payment Banks in Digital Payments-A Case Study of Paytm. Emperor International Journal of Finance and Management Research Received, 5(1), 52–57.

Mehta, P., & Singla, H. (2021). From rags to riches: a case study of Paytm’s inspiring journey from a mobile recharge website to a payments bank. International Journal of Indian Culture and Business Management, 22(4), 519–557.

Mittal, S., Pant, A., & Bhadauria, S. S. (2017). An empirical study on customer preference towards payment banks over universal banks in Delhi NCR. Procedia Computer Science, 122, 463–470.

Naik, V. R., Firdous, P., & Harika, P. (2018). A study on role of payment banks in India—financial inclusion [Paper presentation]. The 5th international conference on recent advances in engineering, science, and management YMCA, Connaught Place, New Delhi (India).

Pramani, R., & Iyer, S. V. (2022). Adoption of payments banks: A grounded theory approach. Journal of Financial Services Marketing, 1(1), 1–22.

Sarkar, S., & Singh, S. (2019). A critical study of payments banks in India. SSRN Electronic Journal.

Sikdar, P., & Kumar, A. (2016). Payment bank: A catalyst for financial inclusion. Asia-Pacific Journal of Management Research and Innovation, 12(3–4), 226–231.

Thathsarani, U. S., & Jianguo, W. (2022). Do digital finance and the technology acceptance model strengthen financial inclusion and SME performance? Information, 13(8), 390.

Vikas, D., & Kumar, A. A. (2018). What Indians Think About Paytm. World Scientific News, (110), 184–196.

Hans. (2020, March 12). The growth of Paytm. The Hans India. https://www.thehansindia.com/hans/young-hans/the-growth-of-paytm-611171

Indian Money. (2019, January 25). Payment banking in India. Indian Money. https://indianmoney.com/articles/payment-banking-in-india