Zerodha co-founder Nikhil Kamath has drawn a compelling parallel between India's Unified Payments System (UPI) and oil, suggesting that payment protocols, much like oil, could significantly shape geopolitics. In a social media post, Kamath questioned whether an India-made standard adopted globally could function as soft power by design, proposing UPI as a potential export rather than merely a domestic success. He underscored various factors, including UPI's extensive footprint and global reach, to emphasize the burgeoning importance of India's indigenous payments infrastructure.

Recently, UPI achieved a remarkable milestone by surpassing Visa in daily transaction volume, recording 65 crore transactions in a single day. This significant accomplishment was reached in an impressively short span of just nine years since its inception, highlighting the rapid adoption and scaling of the system.

According to data shared by Kamath, UPI usage is particularly high in digitally connected urban centers and tourism-driven regions across India. Specific cities and union territories such as Delhi, Chandigarh, Telangana, Goa, Karnataka, Maharashtra, Arunachal Pradesh, Haryana, Ladakh, and Sikkim reported the highest per-person UPI transactions in September 2025, indicating strong regional penetration and digital literacy.

Beyond India's borders, UPI has extended its reach internationally, with several countries adopting the payment system. Bhutan, France, Mauritius, Nepal, Singapore, Sri Lanka, the UAE, and Qatar currently facilitate UPI payments, demonstrating its growing global acceptance and potential for wider international integration.

The usage of UPI witnessed an extraordinary surge during the COVID-19 pandemic. As social distancing protocols necessitated a shift to digital payment alternatives, the volume of UPI transactions dramatically increased from ₹25 crore in June 2017 to a substantial ₹1,840 crore, cementing its role as a crucial tool for financial transactions in a crisis.

Owing to the unparalleled success of UPI, India has emerged as the world's largest payments market. With 129.3 billion transactions, the country recorded over 44% year-on-year growth, significantly outperforming Brazil, which followed with 37.4 billion transactions. Kamath further noted that India now processes more real-time payments than ten other markets combined, underscoring its dominant position in the global digital payments landscape.

Within India's payment ecosystem, UPI holds the dominant share, accounting for approximately 83% of all digital retail transactions. Other payment modes like NEFT, RTGS, debit cards, and credit cards follow. A recent IMF report, "Growing Retail Digital Payments: The Value of Interoperability," recognized India as a global leader in fast payments, attributing this transformative shift primarily to UPI, introduced in 2016 by the National Payments Corporation of India (NPCI), which has revolutionized money transfers for Indians.

Nikhil Kamath's post garnered significant attention and agreement from social media users, with many endorsing the comparison of UPI to oil and hailing it as a prime example of India's soft power. Users emphasized that UPI is not merely a payment system but a symbol of India's technological prowess, advocating for its global export to extend India’s influence and create economic ecosystems. Comments highlighted its potential to offer an alternative to closed networks, foster digital sovereignty for nations, and build a deeper form of Indian soft power, while also raising questions about monetization, patents, data sovereignty, and interoperability standards on a global scale.