Mobile Money Transfer service in India is what Bharti Airtel and Western Union are eyeing. This will allow people to send money to India using mobile phone, though it is still to be approved by regulatory committee. Gopal Vittal, director marketing and communications, Bharti Airtel Limited said We are delighted to work with Western Union in this path-breaking initiative and be at the forefront of enabling international remittance over mobile for our 50 million mobile phone customers in India. This will help us move money via mobile in a fast and convenient way, supporting low-value transactions. Western Union operates in India through 45,000 Agent locations, including 8,500 post offices and more than 14,000 bank branches spread across 5,000 towns and cities. Matt Dill, General Manager, Western Union Mobile said Our association with Bharti Airtel for the Mobile Money Transfer service is an important step in expanding the range of Western Union global services to a new category of consumers across the world. He also added that, This is a very exciting development, especially given the expanse and reach of mobile services in the Indian subcontinent. Mobile based financial service is already being used in few select countries. As per The World Bank’s analysis and report the number of migrants across the globe is 200 million, which accounts up to 3 percent of total population. India is also identified as number one in international transfer of funds (inward) market. RBI’s figures suggest that the annual funds transferred into India were over $26 billion for the financial year of 2006 – 2007, which is 10 percent of the global transfer of funds (inward). Image: Bharti, Western Union Source