Government in its constant initiative of simplifying business environment and attracting foreign fund flow has initiated an extensive survey on ‘ease of doing business’ in states with an objective of improving the business climate of the country. The Department of Industrial Policy and Promotion (DIPP) has circulated a set of 285 questions to all the states in this regard.
India is currently ranked 142nd among 189 nations in the World Bank's Ease of Doing Business 2015 study, while the DIPP's assessment framework for state level reforms enabling ease of doing business 2015 has said that India's overall ranking and the individual rankings in various parameters clearly show that India is in urgent need of reforms to unlock the huge economic potential of the nation and the reforms need to be initiated at various levels across centre, state and local governments.
The key objectives of the DIPP survey are to assess the implementation of various factors enabling ease of doing business in a state and to do a comparative study of states with regards to the implementation status. DIPP has also circulated a document with recommendations for states on aspects critical to enabling ease of doing business and highlights good practices in various areas that need to be institutionalised by states to improve their investment eco-system.
The state governments have to submit by June 20 final responses to the questionnaire. Responses have been sought on any centralised help-line number to facilitate queries regarding the application and approval process and any 'change of land use' provided as a service through the single window system. The questionnaire also include queries on land banks available for industrial use, digitised land records at local municipality office and provision for e-filing for commercial disputes at district courts, among others.
