Bengaluru: The failure to adhere to the set parameters by some government departments has made Karnataka fall to 13th rank in the all India rating of Ease of Doing Business (EODB) for the current year despite the state being ranked number one in terms of attracting investments, said Major Industries Minister R.V. Deshpande.
"I am not happy but surprised with the ranking since the Union Ministry of Trade and Commerce has not considered some of the suggestions made by me a few months ago to consider other things before announcing the rankings. I am writing to Union Commerce Minister Nirmala Sitaraman to at least consider my suggestions while announcing the ranking next time".
Addressing a news conference here on Wednesday, Mr Deshpande admitted that non-compliance with the parameters by the state Urban Development department, Factories and Boilers and Law departments pushed the State to 13th position. As against 35 parameters fixed for the Department of Factories and Boilers, all except seven had been fulfilled. The Urban Development department had complied with only 14 parameters as against 42 and Law Department had complied with only five as against nine parameters.
He stressed the need for urgent steps to overhaul the functioning of Urban Development department as it takes a long time to issue certificates wanted by citizens. For instance, there were eight steps to issue a building permission by Bangalore Development Authority (BDA) which was astonishing. Need of the hour was to promote online receipt and issuance of certificates to avoid delay. With regard to Law department, a commercial court should be set up in each district and a commercial bench should be set up in the High Court which are being considered by judicial authorities.
Giving details of investments, the minister said from January to July 2016, Karnataka attracted an investment of Rs 1,09,773 crore whereas Andhra Pradesh had an investment of Rs 10,848 crore, Telangana Rs 19,000 crore, Gujarat 39,750 crore, Madhya Pradesh Rs 5,587 crore and Odisha Rs 4309 crore. The state of Jharkhand does not figure in the list of investment but had found a place in EODB ranking. Karnataka had been arguing since the beginning that other parameters like investment, creation of human resources, industrial infrastructure and total number of projects implemented by each state should be the benchmark while preparing EODB ranking. Unfortunately, investment parameters were not at all considered by the ministry concerned. Union Minister Nirmala Sitaraman has convened a meeting on November 16 in Delhi where officers from Karnataka would prevail upon her to incorporate the suggestions given by the State.
He said the EODB was not a new concept since Karnataka had brought a legislation, 'Industrial Facilitation Act' long ago. In fact, Karnataka had bagged 9th rank in the last ranking with total points of 48.50.
This time, despite getting 88.39 points, the state had been pushed to 13th place in EODB. The union ministry had set 340 compliances as part of Business Reforms Action Plan of which Karnataka had complied with 301.
The remaining compliances despite met by the State, had been rejected by the ministry on 'technical grounds'. All states had shown improvement in EODB as evaluated by Department of Industrial Policy, Government of India; Karnataka too had improved its implementation percentage from 49 per cent in 2015 to 89 per cent during 2016.
