San Francisco — Facebook, which was struggling for years to win a permit to operate its WhatsApp payments service in India, finally got approval for the rollout, marking a breakthrough year for the tech giant that also saw it partnering billionaire Mukesh Ambani to expand in the world’s biggest open technology market.

WhatsApp pay can go live using the home-grown, multibank Unified Payments Interface (UPI), its operator the National Payments Corporation of India said on Thursday. The US social media giant can gradually expand its UPI base starting with as many as 20-million users. Facebook has been testing WhatsApp payments in India since early 2018...

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