Digital currency: World is learning from China; India must not stay behind

China's rapid advances in developing a digital currency have spurred the world into action. India should not be left behind

In the account of his travel to China in the 13th century, Italian traveller Marco Polo referred to the use of paper money in that country but this was regarded as fantasy back then in Europe. The Chinese had started using paper money in the form of promissory notes, as early as the 9th century during the Tang dynasty. It was several centuries later that paper money became ubiquitous in Europe. There is no fantasy attached to Chinese advances in introducing the world’s first sovereign digital currency or the Central Bank Digital Currency (CBDC). It is already undergoing trials in