Indian Finance Minister, Nirmala Sitharaman spoke on blockchain technology at the event where she praised the technology by calling it “absolutely imperative”. However, she also highlighted the “inherent risk” associated with its anonymity factor.
She made clear of the government’s stance on distributed ledger technology (DLT) and stated that the government also recognizes the use cases of blockchain technology.
“The anonymity is what … one unknown element in this whole thing. The anonymity of the person or whoever or the robot is the one which we have to be absolutely readying ourselves as … a future challenge,” Ms. Sitharaman said, addressing the NSDL event.
The statement was released just before the launch of the budgetary announcement of central bank digital currency (CBDC), a virtual currency built on blockchain technology.
Earlier, Sitharaman warned about crypto by indicating its use in money laundering and terror financing.
Sitharaman has repeatedly stretched the anonymity term as a “powerful imponderable” in the entire speech. She stated that “unless we are able to guard ourselves against that anonymous element which can itself pose an inherent risk, we probably will be exposing ourselves much more than ever we would have imagined.”
She praised Madhabi Puri Buch, chief of Securities and Exchange Board of India for “rightly warning” about the risk associated with anonymity and counting pros on DLTs in her briefing before her.
Ms Buch revealed the absence of anonymity in the CBDC project, which is going to be launched this year by the Reserve Bank of India. She acknowledged the perks of DLTs including transparency, real-time, infinite divisibility and it being a cost effective medium.
