Supreme Court Upholds New 0.4% MDR on UPI Payments Over Rs 2,000

Supreme Court rejected a petition to halt the government’s plan to levy a merchant discount rate on UPI transactions above Rs 2,000, paving the way for a 0.4% charge from Oct 15. The decision means person‑to‑merchant payments crossing the Rs 2,000 threshold will carry the new fee. The National High Speed Rail Corporation Limited unveiled a 100‑metre steel bridge weighing about 1,405 tonnes for the Mumbai‑Ahmedabad bullet‑train line in Maharashtra. Foreign Secretary Vikram Misri met a bipartisan US Congressional delegation led by Representative Brian Mast, discussing the Sanctioning Russia and Iran Act, energy security, counter‑terrorism and freedom of navigation. Iranian cleric Mohsen Heydari told Qatari channel Al Araby that Supreme Leader Mojtaba Khamenei was rescued from the rubble of a Tehran hospital after US and Israeli strikes hit the building; he said Khamenei had been injured earlier and was receiving treatment. Hyderabad’s 21‑year‑old pistol shooter Esha Singh secured India’s first silver medal on day ten of the Asian Games, finishing second in the women’s 25 m pistol event. China topped the Games with 205 medals, while India has earned 37 medals so far. Indian space startup TakeMe2Space will launch the MOI‑1A satellite, a sub‑50 kg computing satellite equipped with Nvidia Orin NX processors, on SpaceX’s Transporter‑18 mission on Oct 1, claiming it as the nation’s first in‑orbit data‑processing satellite. Kerala tourism minister PC Vishnunadh announced a plan to double the state’s tourism revenue to Rs 90,000 crore within five years. A high‑powered task force on exam reforms, chaired by Nandan Nilekani, consulted former ISRO chief K Radhakrishnan following the 2024 NEET‑UG paper leak. IIT Jammu held its seventh convocation, awarding 420 degrees across B.Tech, M.Tech, M.Sc and PhD programmes.

Context

The MDR on UPI aims to generate revenue for the digital payments ecosystem, while the bullet‑train bridge marks progress on India’s high‑speed rail network. The computing satellite reflects a growing trend of private Indian firms entering space technology.