After launching Pakistan’s first Islamic calendar on Sunday, Federal Science and Technology Minister Fawad Chaudhry announced on Monday that he wants to implement a mobile phone payment system in the country.
The minister took to Twitter on Monday morning, fresh off his successful launch of a controversial Islamic calendar that has been seen as a challenge to religious clerics, particularly the Ruet-e-Hilal Committee. He said that his next big challenge is replacing debit and credit cards with a mobile phone payment system.
For technology to progress, we need payments to become easier, he said, adding that God willing, in the next few months all payments, from bus fares to buying cars, will be made using mobile phones.
This would be a very good initiative as Pakistan is lagging behind while other developed countries have already adopted mobile payment systems leaving behind debit cards. Moreover, our people are less adaptive to new technologies, so it’s not just launching a new system for it instead it will take them to change the whole mindset of people through different campaigns. Fawad Chaudhry wants to end debit cards in Pakistan
Many other departments like PTCL are also trying to promote the paperless environment and shift to the e-billing system. It will take time for sure, but one we are done with debit cards, and shift to mobile payments, our lives will get easier.
