The Reserve Bank of India, or RBI, continues to investigate the issuance of a central bank digital currency, or CBDC. T Rabi Sankar, the deputy governor of RBI, said in a speech organized by the Vidhi Center for Legal Policy that private digital currencies could be part of what makes CBDCs ultimately necessary. He felt that the RBI’s development of it’s own CBDC could provide the public with many of the same uses as digital currencies such as Bitcoin, while limiting the average user’s exposure to volatility. He stated: “Indeed, this could be the key factor nudging central banks from …
India has been the subject of intense speculation regarding the future legal status of Bitcoin (BTC) and other cryptocurrencies in recent months. Speculation went into overdrive in February when an anonymous Indian minister told Bloomberg that a nationwide blanket ban on cryptocurrency was imminent and that holders would be given a matter of months to dispense with their coins and tokens. Fears were then allayed — somewhat — when finance minister Nirmala Sitharaman told CNBC that reports of a blanket ban on cryptocurrencies had been overstated, adding that any pending regulation would take a much more “calibrated” approach. Perhaps it …
Tata Power DDL, a leading electricity distribution company that serves over seven million residents in North Delhi, is piloting a solar energy trading project together with Australian blockchain firm PowerLedger and the India Smart Grid Forum, or ISGF. The pilot, which runs until June, aims to enable the development of distributed energy infrastructure and electronic trading resources that will encourage consumers to become prosumers — consumers who also produce — by selling their excess rooftop solar power in a peer-to-peer marketplace. Using PowerLedger's blockchain technology to provide transparent settlement of energy trades, the pilot will test out various trading algorithms, …
India’s citizens will soon be able to cast votes from outside their city of registration thanks to a blockchain-based system. According to The Times of India on Feb. 13, India’s Chief Election Commissioner Sunil Arora said that the country hopes to increase voter turnout with a blockchain-based voting solution. Using blockchain to prevent “lost votes” Arora said that, in the 2019 elections, 300 million eligible voters did not vote because they were either not politically engaged or were far from where their registered voting district on election day. The Times of India states that the country has over 450 million …
Cion Digital, a developer for an enterprise SaaS blockchain orchestration platform, announced on Jan 4 that it had closed out its recent seed funding round at $12 million. The round was overseen by Green Visor Capital and 645 Ventures who have since joined Cion Digital’s board of directors. Additionally, Cota Capital, Epic Ventures, Hourglass Capital Partners, BAT Ventures, Greycroft and Ulu Ventures were also participants. Following the raise, the company said that it intends to allocate these funds toward its new resource and development center in Pune, India in an effort to further expand the project’s payment infrastructure. There, the …