The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) has built a high-security data centre in Bhubaneswar, Odisha, located on an 18.55-acre campus at Info Valley-II in Khordha. The greenfield facility is intended to house core computing systems that support currency management, payment and settlement operations and regulatory data functions, according to analysts and officials. The site was chosen to strengthen continuity of core systems by reducing exposure to cross-border threats and seismic risks.

This is the central bank's second data centre, with the primary data centre located in Kharghar, Navi Mumbai. By situating the facility away from Mumbai and Chennai, which host a large share of the country's data centres, the RBI has reduced reliance on dense digital traffic corridors and subsea cable landing points. Analysts noted that the choice may help insulate critical systems from concentrated cyber risks and network vulnerabilities. The central bank did not provide comment when approached.

Industry officials said the principal driver is the safety of financial data, now treated as critical national infrastructure, alongside the need to guard against cyberattacks, vendor lock-in and operational disruptions. For central banks, direct control over infrastructure enables stricter enforcement of security protocols, redundancy planning and regulatory compliance. With digital transactions and real-time payment systems expanding rapidly, authorities are treating secure data infrastructure as a cornerstone of financial stability.

The facility has been designed with high redundancy, resilience and system availability, incorporating fault tolerance and achieving Tier IV certification for its design, according to the central bank. Analysts highlighted that Odisha offers abundant land, water and power and lies largely in lower seismic risk zones compared with the Himalayan belt, reducing vulnerability to high-intensity earthquakes. The RBI is also launching a pilot cloud facility in 2025 with data centres in Mumbai and Hyderabad as part of a broader policy emphasis on institutional control over mission-critical systems to minimise exposure to external threats and ensure uninterrupted functioning of the financial backbone.