NEW DELHI: The government should replace the Foreign Investment Promotion Board with a simple and business friendly mechanism at the earliest, a Parliamentary panel has suggested. The Department Related Parliamentary Standing Committee on Commerce in its report said it was informed that once the Foreign Investment Promotion Board (FIPB) is dissolved then there is a possibility that concerned ministries overseeing sectors that require government approval for FDI would be authorised to approve the investment.

The committee desires that the Department of Industrial Policy and Promotion (DIPP) "should ensure a simple and business friendly mechanism at the earliest". It also asked the government to take necessary measures to ensure that FDI equity inflows are actual investments. The committee notes that low private investments have been one of the constraints flagged by various credit rating agencies in raising the business ratings of the country.

By the end of March this year, government will have some significant improvement in ease of doing business. You can now start a new business in India in six days, compared to the current scenario where it takes 26 days. The change is a result of cutting down the procedures required to start a company. The procedures have been halved to six from 12. In Delhi, a company needs to follow 12 procedures to incorporate a company. Mumbai take 14 days as you have to register for profession tax.

Among the 190 countries for this index of ease of doing business, India ranks 130 in 2017 up from 134 in 2015; the ranking further deteriorates in terms of starting a new business as India is ranked 155. Since 2015, government has launched programmes that aim at making it easier to do business in India. The efforts yielded results with India jumping 4 places on the World Bank Doing Business ranking.
 

MUMBAI: The government’s recent decision to allow foreign direct investment (FDI) in limited liability partnerships (LLP) is set to improve ease of doing business, according to a research report by Deloitte. Reserve Bank of India (RBI) has, on 3 March 2017, notified Foreign Exchange Management (Transfer or Issue of Security by a Person Resident outside India) (Second Amendment) Regulations, 2017 (FEMA Amendment Regulations), the report said. 

“The amendments would facilitate ease of doing business in India. It gives much clarity on conversion of a company with FDI into a LLP under automatic route. LLP can now access ECBs subject to further amendments being made in ECB framework,” it added.

LONDON: India's key messages during the Commonwealth summit being held in London this week will focus on ease of doing business in the country and creating a strong export economy, a senior Indian diplomat said today. The inaugural Commonwealth Trade Ministers' Meeting is being held over two days starting today, with ministers and policymakers from across the Commonwealth set to discuss areas for increased collaboration. 

India is being represented at the meeting by Commerce Secretary Rita Teaotia. "The key messages are around ease of doing business in India and all the initiatives being taken by the Government of India. To a large extent there is a recognition that India is doing well in this area and gone up in the World Bank rankings. There is a recognition that trade and investment go together," said Dinesh Patnaik, deputy high commissioner to the UK. 

India improved its ease of doing business ranking last year–moving up from 131 to 130 in a list of 190 countries–by reducing the average time taken to start an enterprise and secure a permanent electricity connection, according to 2016 World Bank data. However, an IndiaSpend analysis of these data shows that India still ranks among the worst performers on other key parameters. Using five parameters, IndiaSpend picked 10 nations across seven regions to compare India’s ease of doing business–south and east Asia (including China), developed countries, sub-Saharan Africa, lower middle income countries such as India (with per capita incomes between $1026 and $4035) and the European Union. In most indicators, India ranked low, coming closest to sub-Saharan African countries.

The five indicators are all related to the time taken to get key tasks completed. Those include: (1) starting a business, (2) building a warehouse and equip the industrial premises with water and sewerage connection, telephone line and safety measures, (3) getting permanent provision of electricity, (4) completing legal procedures and (5) resolving insolvency if a business fails. We compared these parameters in India with three country groups over the decade 2007 to 2016: (1) neighbouring Asian countries (2) developed countries and (3) differently developed country groups.

NEW DELHI: New trademark rules with simplified processes, fewer forms and online filing will come into effect next week, substantially improving the ease of doing business on this front. The amended rules, which the Department of Industrial Policy and Promotion is expected to notify on March 6, will cut the number of trademark application forms to eight from 74 and scrap several redundant and obsolete provisions. 

To encourage online filing of applications, a 10% fee concession will be offered. For individuals, startups and small enterprises, the government will provide discounted application fees and expedited processing. "Email has been made an essential part of the address for service towards our aim to digitise processes and go paperless," a senior official said. The number of adjournments that can be sought in opposition proceedings has been restricted to two by each party to help dispose matters speedily. Alongside, the option of conducting hearings through video conferencing has been introduced. 

NEW DELHI: State governments have urged the Centre to reduce the action points for reforms to a doable number for this year’s ease of doing business ranking, raising issues with the agenda drawn up by the Department of Industrial Policy and Promotion (DIPP). After cutting the number of action points to less than 300, the department had introduced sub-points, taking the total to nearly 680 reforms.

In contrast, last year states had to implement 340 reforms and the rankings were based on the outcome achieved. The DIPP, while stressing that it had brought down the number of reforms, had gone for a deeper dive into every individual action point. This nearly doubled the work for states this year. “States have conveyed that it would not be possible to implement so many reforms within a few months… We are still finalising the final set of reforms,” said a senior government official.

NEW DELHI: The Competition Commission of India is assessing regulations across sectors in efforts to weed out "obsolete regulatory restrictions" and improve the ease of doing business. CCI Chairman D K Sikri today said the regulator is assessing policies, laws and regulations relating to different sectors of the Indian economy from competition perspective. He also said the regulator would be connecting with the NITI Aayog for this purpose. 

"The objective is to identify unnecessary and obsolete regulatory restrictions as also to suggest pro-competitive regulatory reforms," he said. Further, Sikri noted that these measures would contribute to the larger agenda of improving ease of doing business and propelling economic growth. He was speaking here at the national conference on economics of competition law.