On the morning of April 12, UPI ghosted India again. For the third time this month, and the sixth time in a year, the country's most trusted wingman for chai, cabs, samosas, and survival just… disappeared. The outage hit all the usual suspects: Google Pay, Paytm, PhonePe (Amazon Pay too, we’d imagine, but we don’t know anyone who uses Amazon Pay).
Screens froze. QR codes blinked blankly. Phones were waved in frustration at bewildered shopkeepers. #UPIDown trended on X, as always, with a perfect mix of sarcasm and genuine panic.
But behind the memes was a quieter question: if UPI died tomorrow, what would happen to our daily lives? Do young people even carry cash anymore?
The answer, it turns out, is layered. And often hilarious.
Let’s start with the obvious: for many urban Indians in their late teens and twenties, wallets are relics. Mohit, a student from Ramaiah Institute of Technology (RIT) Bangalore, hasn’t touched one in two years.
“My wallet is collecting dust. My dad used to tell me to keep cash for emergencies, but I just… don’t anymore,” he shrugs. The last time he used cash? “A bus ticket in my first year of college. I had to, because the destination wasn’t on my pass.”
He’s not alone. Another student — who didn’t want to be named (you’ll see why shortly) — told us his only recent cash purchase was with a chaiwala whose Paytm sticker had faded into oblivion. “I had to borrow coins, bro. From friends. Coins.”
Meanwhile, Rahul, a student leader from Hyderabad, carries a modest Rs 500. Not in a wallet, though — in the back of his phone cover, which, in his words, has replaced the wallet. That little cash stash came to the rescue today during this latest outage, when both his bank UPI apps failed while buying groceries.
“The Rs 500 note was not sufficient, and I had to cancel some of the things I’d picked up. It was embarrassing. Others in line were also stuck, they did not have any cash with them either,” he said.
That moment — the checkout stand freeze — is becoming its own brand of Gen Z horror. The anonymous student we spoke to lived it on his birthday, at a pub.
“I was treating my friends. Everyone’s drinking and laughing, and I go up to pay the bill and the app won’t load. The bouncers are watching me. My backup UPI fails. My phone battery’s low. I was so close to pulling out my dad’s credit card, but the name of the pub would’ve shown up on the statement, and my family doesn’t know I drink! In that moment, I did not know whom I was more scared of: the bouncers, or my parents…”
He survived, barely, after ten minutes of sweating bullets, when the UPI payment finally went through. And no, his family still doesn’t know he drinks. And yes, he’d really like for it to stay that way.
Then there’s Anshul, a young IP Associate from Mangalore who does always have money in his wallet, but also often forgets to have the wallet on him. He admitted that he once went two weeks without his wallet, and that he only later realised that it wasn’t even in the same city as him.
“I once paid a Rapido driver Rs 25 in coins,” he says. “I’d missed the last metro, so I’d booked a Rapido. No, I wasn’t carrying my wallet that day either. When we reached my apartment, my UPI wasn’t working because of my bank’s scheduled maintenance. I asked him to wait, went upstairs, and, thankfully, I had just enough cash and coins at home to go back and pay him.”
And just when we thought we’d heard it all, along came Asmita, a video producer from Raipur, who floats above all this with calm, calculated wisdom. She always carries Rs 2–3k, split between her wallet and phone cover.
When we asked her if she’s ever experienced any kind of payment-failure related embarrassment, she said, “I don’t hang out with a lot of people. Embarrass hone ke liye logo ke saath ghoomna padta hai. (I can’t be embarrassed in front of people if I’m not hanging out with people).”
Before we could decide whether to laugh awkwardly or take notes, she was already moving on. “But I’ve never really had a payment fail,” she added. “Even if it does, I just have to retry and it works.”
We asked her what her secret is.
“My bank servers are rarely down. ICICI has good service,” she responded smugly.
Weird flex but okay. Honestly; we can’t remember the last time we heard an ICICI flex.
If there’s a single line that captures how young Indians live now, then Anshul, in the end, may have put it best:
“If and when I leave this country, I’m going to take a while to get used to carrying cash again. One of my friends moved to London last year and he’s been missing UPI ever since. In India, all we need at this point is a phone and we can do whatever we want.”
Until, of course, that phone betrays you. Or your bank server crashes. Or the QR code flakes out. Or the signal dies. Or the café’s Wi-Fi is locked. Or you're drunk and suddenly very afraid of what your parents might read on their next credit card statement.
In 2025, UPI has evolved into something that’s less a convenience and more a nervous system — invisible, essential, and prone to drama. When it works, it’s magic. When it doesn’t, even the most cash-free twenty-somethings will admit: they miss the quiet, rectangular certainty of a Rs 100 note.
So do they carry cash? Not really.
But should they? Probably.
And will they? Eh.
Let’s see what memes trend the next time UPI goes down.
