The share of traditional cash and cheque-based transactions is projected to fall to 15 per cent by 2020, with alternative models being increasingly adopted, a report by Boston Consultancy Group said.

"Cash and cheques, which dominate the transaction profile in the country at present with 49 per cent of transactions are expected to go down to 15 per cent by 2020," the consultancy firm said in a recent report.

Payments through cash and cheques had accounted for 94 per cent of the total transactions in 2003 and the share has been on the downslide ever since.

Alternative transaction models like ATMs, mobile phones, points of sale and internet-banking have been steadily increasing their shares over the years, the report said. It added that mobile banking will gather more steam in the days ahead, driven primarily by the smartphones.

"Mobile phones, propelled by 3G and the smartphone technology, will emerge as an undisputed winner by 2020, potentially accounting for 20-30 per cent of the total transactions," the report said. Banks in the developed world have been very swift in technology adoption. In Britain, a proposal has also been mooted to ban cheques by 2018.

In the domestic context, banks will adopt mobile for an array of activities like online banking, which will include bill payments etc, and for commerce on both the payment as well as acceptance side, the report said.

Adoption of mobile-based platforms will also ensue in productivity enhancement for banks as mobile transactions cost much less than ATM or branch-based ones, the report added.