Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Monday,4th March 2019, launched India's first indigenously-developed National Common Mobility Card(NCMC) and now people can pay multiple kinds of transport charges, including metro services and toll tax, with just one in all card, across the country.
Gone are the days when we need to carry multiple cards like metro card, bus card , and various debit cards for different usage.Mimicked as 'One Nation One Card', the mobility card would allow the person to pay for their bus travel, toll taxes, parking charges, retail shopping and even withdraw money.
Speaking on the launch PM said, "This card runs on RuPay card and it will eliminate all your travel related problems. Many a times, we do not have change to pay in cash while travelling in metro, bus or train, or for toll and parking.To overcome this issue, an automatic fare collection system was introduced ".
In India, people prefer to use Public Transport as the economical and convenient mode of travelling and cash continues to be the most preffered mode of fare payments across the public transport.However, cash payment has its own limitations cash handling,revenue leakages,cash reconcilation etc. are some of them.Various initiatives have been taken by transit operators to automate and digitize the fare collection using Automatic Fare Collection System (AFC).
The major challenge associated with AFC System implementation in India till now is the lack of indegenous solution provider.Till now, AFC System deployed at various Metros are from foreign players.In order to avoid the vendor lock-in and create an interoperable system,there was a need to develop indegenous standards and AFC system under Make In India initiative.
In order to ensure a seamless travel across metros and other transport systems in addition to retail shopping and purchases,the Ministry of Housing and Urban Affair (MoHUA) came out with the National Common Mobility Card (NCMC) program.
How it will be useful?
It's super-quick, contactless transaction feature will help to improve seamless travel experience.This card supports various service area features such as monthly passes, season tickets, etc.It also offers value proposition for customers as they need not to carry multiple cards for different usage.
This card is similar to any RuPay debit/credit card, which will be available with more than 25 banks, including the State Bank Of India (SBI).This card can be used for making payments across all segments including metro, bus, suburban railways, smart city and retail shopping.This card offers cashback on bill payments and more than thousand other offers.
After Demonetisation, India has been on a shift towards cashless transactions and this will definitely be a step towards making India a cashless economy.
