WhatsApp can go ahead with the rollout of 'WhatsApp Pay' in India in a graded manner, the National Payments Corporation of India (NPCI) announced on Thursday. It will first be allowed to do so with a maximum of 20 million registered users of UPI.

Starting from January 2021, third party apps like these will be capped to a maximum of 30 percent of all transactions in the future, NPCI said. It is bound to affect Google Pay and PhonePe as both of them have a transaction share cap of 40 percent as far as UPI transactions in India in concerned.

Meanwhile, PhonePe, a popular digital wallet platform and online payment company based in India, recently announced that it has hit the 250 million user mark.

WhatsApp Pay was initially expected to launch in India around Diwali last year. Many feared that the 400 million user base that the company had at the time would give it an unfair advantage.