Cashless economy and the "Returns pick up" guy

A lot has been spoken and written about demonetisation drive in India and lengthy debates still ensue in social media about whether it has done or any good or not to the Indian economy in general. I made a trip recently to India and had a chance to take stock of the post demonetisation scenario on the urban and rural public. The jury is still out on whether it was a overall good move for the economy or not (and since the debate has been heavily politicised , the truth will take some time to emerge, if it ever will). However, I noted one striking point though,  I was amazed how the general public has taken to technology with relative ease. Be it auto drivers displaying QR codes or 80 year old using a payment app to pay at the Tea shop, I saw across the board people have taken to being cashless with an ease that is quite astounding. Taking to the streets, rioting and protesting violently and otherwise against the regimes seems to be not for the Indians - although this may stem from a general apathy to the governance system , there is some value to this approach. In the case of the demonetisation shock treatment (which it was for sure), although the social media is rife with negative (and positive) sentiments , one effect cannot be argued away and that is the general public has moved one step (at least) forward to being tech savvy. In a real sense people understand for example what a Mobile App is and what it does and that it can do. I remember noted director G. Aravindan´s award winning malayalam movie "Oridathu"  which describes the apprehensions of a village as electricity comes to them for the first time. Set in the late 1970s there is a remarkable scene where a crow gets electrocuted from the newly laid power line and the whole village crowds around it lamenting the evil new technology. Whether we like it or not new technology will keep coming until it stops coming and until then great to see the adaptability and resilience of the Indians (1.2 Billion of them of whom 30% cannot read or write but can most likely transact cashless, cool me thinks !!)

P.S : On adaption, guess what does the slightly complicated job title of "Returns pick-up person"  refer to ? He hangs around the entrances and pathways to the sprawling tech parks (for example in Bangalore, may be other enterprises in other cities) with a mobile enabled device (at first glance looked like a electronic volt meter to me) and picks up the items for return that the young techie crowd has purchased online. The techies save time (and traffic pain) by not having to go to the logistics service center and the "Returns pick up" guy, well  he makes a living. Count on enterprising humans to discover ever more ways of finding a way forward - Homosapiens Sapiens indeed !!