NPCI Eyes Unified Agent Protocol to Power Trusted AI Payments on UPI

NPCI is developing a Unified Agent Protocol to let verified AI agents initiate UPI transactions, positioned as a trust and verification layer atop existing rails. Agents will be registered, verified, and authorized before use. The framework builds on Razorpay‑NPCI pilots with OpenAI and Claude using UPI Reserve Pay. With 23.2B UPI transactions in May 2026, the protocol could also enable agent‑to‑agent workflows for compliance automation.