It is not surprising that India has slipped two places to the 142nd position in the ease of doing business index compiled by the World Bank since it pertains to the year ending May 2014, which reflects the period of the Manmohan Singh regime. It would be cause for tremendous concern if this ranking spills over to the Narendra Modi era.
The World Bank has recognised some of the baby steps taken recently by the Centre and the states to make business easier. But more serious steps have to be taken in areas like cutting down time for granting permission to start businesses, granting construction permits, dealing with land acquisition, water and electricity permissions, etc.. Not very much seems to have happened after May 2014 since businessmen still complain about the scores of forms that need filling.
One business chamber this week published a list of 105 laws that need to be reviewed if the PM’s “Make in India” dream is to take off.
Most importantly, corruption will have to be eliminated if the laws and rules that will be brought in are to be implemented.
In Maharashtra, for instance, former Chief Minister Prithviraj Chavan and the Mumbai municipal commissioner had issued instructions that time-bound decisions had to be taken in giving permission for construction of buildings. But their buildings department flouted the instruction and fixed bribe amounts that builders had to be pay per square foot for clearances.
Mr Narendra Modi could get Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis to tear up this bribery list by coming Monday to send a strong signal to everybody nationwide.
