And it has completely transformed how payments happen. paymets happen directly from bank account to bank account regardlessof what app you're using (Samsung Pay, PhonePe, GPay, your bank's app). You can use QR codes or simple username@bank to make payments.
I am not aware of any payment systems that support the use of NFC, (NFC is not that commonplace for anything except cards, and I have had trouble setting up cards in google pay). One of the biggest benefits of QR based payments have been is it does not require any special hardware. Just a mobile and Internet (Which is very common and accessible here). And it has little to no transaction fees. So it has been quickly adopted by literally everyone.
[1] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unified_Payments_Interface