Prime Minister (PM) Imran Khan will be launching Raast, an instant payment system, by State Bank of Pakistan (SBP) today.
According to a tweet by the SBP, the launch ceremony will begin at 4.30 pm and will be broadcasted live on Facebook.
Raast is Pakistan’s first instant payment system that will enable end-to-end digital payments among individuals, businesses and government entities instantaneously.
The state-of-the-art faster payment system will be used to settle small-value retail payments in real time while at the same time provide cheap and universal access to all players in the financial industry, including banks and fintechs.
Earlier last week, SBP Deputy Governor Sima Kamil had said that the central bank aims to reduce the volume of cash-based transactions under the new system, as a number of social issues arise due to the prevalent system.
She informed that in the first step, instant credit of dividends from listed companies to shareholders will be initiated. “In the next phase, that will take a number of months the payment system would digitize the payments made to government employees in wages and pension, this would be fast, free and safe,” she added.
The new payment system would also digitise the Benazir Income Support Programme (BISP) and Ehsaas payments by June.
