Narendra Modi, Prime Minister of India, speaks during the United Nations General Assembly on Saturday, September 26, 2020.
Daniel Acker | Bloomberg | Getty Images
The Indian government intends to introduce a bill in the lower house of the country that would ban private cryptocurrencies such as bitcoin and create a national cryptocurrency.
The so-called “cryptocurrency and regulation of the official digital currency bill” is moving “to create a facilitating framework for the creation of the official digital currency to be issued by the Reserve Bank of India”.
In addition, “the bill also seeks to ban all private cryptocurrencies in India, however, allows certain exceptions to promote core cryptocurrency technology and its uses.”
Bitcoin rose more than 20 percent to $ 38,566 on Friday after Elon Musk changed his personal biography on Twitter to #bitcoin.
This is not the first time that Indian lawmakers have taken such a strong stance on cryptocurrencies. In 2018, an Indian government group recommended banning all private cryptocurrencies and proposed criminals up to 10 years in prison.
In the same year, Indian Finance Minister Arun Jaitley said: “The government does not recognize cryptocurrency as a legal means of payment or currency and will take all measures to eliminate the use of these cryptocurrencies in financing illegal activities or as part of the cryptocurrency system. payments. “
Many countries – including the United States, China, Japan, Canada, Venezuela, Estonia, Sweden and Uruguay – have explored their own digital currencies.
However, there are significant differences between national digital currencies and private cryptocurrencies, such as bitcoin. Cryptocurrencies such as bitcoin are decentralized, while national digital currencies are usually centralized.