New Delhi : Mastercard International plans to aggressively target the Indian debit card market this year. ``We will induct at least half a dozen institutions for debit cards and around four banks for credit card,'' says Mr Sameer Vakil, vice-president and country manager, South Asia, MasterCard International. ``We expect that in the next three years, the debit card base will be much bigger than the credit card.''MasterCard International has already secured a debit card base of five lakh subscribers in India in the last three years. As for credit card operations, MasterCard leads the 4-million-a-year market with around 2.6 million subscribers.
While the company's debit card network includes only four banks - HDFC, Citibank, Centurion, Bank of Punjab - for credit card business, it has alliances with 27 banks and institutions.
In a recent three-day anniversary meet of the Indian Co-operation Committee (ICC) in Jaipur (February 15-17, 2001), MasterCard discussed the issues pertaining to the card infrastructure and business. The ICC comprises 15 leading banks in India, which also conducts quarterly meets to thrash out growth stategies for the card industry.
Mr Vakil says that the ICC, which is basically a MasterCard platform for the institutions, has already helped in arresting the incidence of defaults . To support the card operations, Mastercard follows a four-pronged plan: write operating regulations for the business; provide authorisation backbone; lend clearing and settlement infrastructure; and act as an arbitrator in the industry.
Copyright © 2001 Indian Express Newspapers (Bombay) Ltd.
