KYC and centralisation means govt will promise your money is there. These are essential for dev country or 3rd world. Even with so much kyc often there are fraud. This has minimised fraud.

If you are looking for RMS style freedom etc then look elsewhere. This is not Iceland or Nordic.

One another overlooked issue is India was the largest printer of currency. Until UPI etc modernisation - lots of torn currency - usually caused arguments/inconveniences among population. Also often shopkeepers or transport agencies did not return proper money change upon payment.

Irrespective of privacy, now it take few seconds to pay. Just works. Even without NFC. No worry about return change.