Panaji: Citizens in all the 14 municipal towns in the state will soon be able to avail of civic services and pay municipal bills by logging onto a website. The move to provide civic services and an online facility to urban residents is part of the reforms being undertaken by the urban development department in the state. "Payment for services like house tax, property tax and other services will be available on a common service delivery portal which will be accessible for all urban local bodies in the state," director for urban development and municipal administration, J Ashok Kumar said.

As of now just three civic bodies, including Corporation of the city of Panaji, provide online payment facilities to their residents. This service will be extended to other towns by November end, Kumar told TOI.
Payment of house tax, property tax and payment for other services will be through the online portal. Users will have to log in and select their municipality and the service or bill that they want to pay.​

The CPI(M) led LDF government in Kerala today decided to promulgate an ordinance under its policy of 'Ease of Doing Business' for getting clearance to start industries from different departments without hurdles and delay.  The state cabinet meeting, chaired by Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan, resolved to recommend to Governor Justice P Sathasivam to promulgate the 'Kerala Investment Promotion and Facilitation Act-2017', an official release said here.

The objective was to transform the state into a vibrant investment destination and accelerate its industrial growth, it said. The new act was being formulated after making amendments in seven legislations, including the Kerala Panchayat Raj Act, Kerala Groundwater Restriction Act, Kerala Shops and Commercial Establishment Act and Kerala Loading and Unloading act, the release said.

Rajahmundry: AP builders are happy lot as they do not have to wait for their building plan to be approved by authorities. This follows a representation to  Chief Minister N. Chandrababu Naidu recently in Visakhapatnam by AP Credai seeking his intervention to solve inordinate delay in getting post-approval inspection as well as Occupancy Certificate. A new memo has been issued by the State Government to check delays and facilitate the building process.

In compliance with Ease of Doing Business policy of the Central government, the State Government has issued a memo (No. 800211/H2/2017) to the department of municipal administration and urban development recently. To avoid inordinate delay in the conducting of post approval inspection and issuing of Occupancy Certificate, the State Government has proposed to make changes in its existing procedure of uploading building plans and getting approvals. As per the new procedure, once the building plan is uploaded in AutoCAD and if the plan is in conformity with building by laws approved by the government, the applicant will get a payment advice to get approval for the building plan. Once the payment is made, the plan appr-oval will be given immediately. Now the concerned town planners are supposed to inspect the site and carry out post-approval inspection.

New Delhi, Oct 17 (PTI) The commerce and industry ministry has eased the mechanism for processing foreign direct investment (FDI) proposals by doing away with the requirement of sending the applications to the department of revenue. Amending a provision in the standard operating procedure for processing of FDI proposals, the Department of Industrial Policy and Promotion (DIPP) today said that marking of proposals to the revenue department for their comments has been "discontinued" with immediate effect.

The move is aimed at further promoting ease of doing business in the country to attract overseas inflows. Earlier all proposals were forwarded to the ministry of external affairs and the department of revenue for information. After the abolition of Foreign Investment Promotion Board (FIPB), the government came out with standard operating procedure in June. Under this, the government would clear all foreign direct investment proposals requiring approval within a maximum of 10 weeks after the receipt of an application.

CHENNAI: From Wednesday you can submit your building plan proposals online (http://ppacmda.tn.gov.in/) for approval by Chennai Metropolitan Development Authority (CMDA).  Sources indicated that the Chief Minister is likely to inaugurate the website on Wednesday where in online submission of Planning Permission Application (PPA) can be made. Not only that. Even the portal of Tamil Nadu Real Estate Regulatory Authority (TNRERA) is likely to be inaugurated the same day. Interestingly, the online submission of planning permission will be introduced by CMDA after more than nine years it was kept pending. Sources indicated that it will ensure transparency in the whole process. The website states that from now onwards no manual applications will be accepted.

It is learnt that the single window portal will be integrated with 32 services of seven to eight departments. The decision to start ‘Online submission and processing of PPA’ started following instructions by the Chief Secretary who chaired a meeting on ‘Ease of Doing Business’. Under Ease of Doing Business, it will become imperative for the State to decide on the PPA within 45 days under the single window clearance. However, sources indicated that the success of online submission of PPA depends on implementation of the Tamil Nadu Common Building Rules and National Building Code 2016 which will ensure responsibility and accountability to planning permission applicants.

The Haryana government has decided to have a single joint site inspection by various government agencies, authorities and development authorities. In accordance with the Ease of Doing Business (EoDB) guidelines, the state government has integrated the multiple site inspection by various agencies into single joint site inspection on Tuesdays, an official spokesperson said here today.

All the officers concerned or officials of the Town and Country Planning department have been directed to ensure strict compliance of these orders in letter and spirit, he said.

Local Administration Minister A. Namassivayam on Wednesday launched the online property tax payment facility for the Puducherry and Oulgaret Municipalities. Mr. Namassivayam rolled out the Local Government Receipts Accounts Monitoring System (LGRAMS) and websites of Puducherry and Oulgaret Municipalities. At present, the online payment facility is only for property tax but will shortly be extended to payment of trade licence and user charges.

The public can pay the tax through the website http:/propertytax.puducherry.gov,ini by logging in with their property tax assessment number, OTP verification code, payment term, and pay the amount through bank card (debit/credit / net banking) and download the receipt for successful transaction. The website was developed by the Local Administration Department in collaboration with the National Informatics Centre (NIC), Puducherry.

The Tamil Nadu government is planning to introduce a business facilitation Bill next month that will be backed by a legislation to put the state on the investment map again. The state has slipped from the 12th to the 18th spot this year in ease of doing business rankings, released by the Department of Industrial Policy and Promotion (DIPP) last week.

The state government said of the 50 memoranda of understanding (MoUs) signed during the 2015 Global Investors Meet, 43 projects were under various stages of implementation. But, of the committed Rs 1 lakh crore, only Rs 30,000 crore had been realised.  During the meet, Tamil Nadu had signed 98 MoUs worth about Rs 2.42 lakh crore.

Speaking at the Southern India Chamber of Commerce and Industry's 107th annual general meeting, Shilpa Prabhakar Satish, executive vice-chairperson of the Tamil Nadu Industrial Guidance and Export Promotion Bureau, said of the total 98 MoUs signed, around 50 worth — Rs 1 lakh crore — come under industry department. Of these, 43 projects, worth about Rs 30,000 crore, were under implementation. And, 10 projects were being inaugurated while foundation stones of seven had been laid. She said seven projects hadn't started due to internal issues and the government was trying to start them soon. Some projects related to energy and petroleum projects, which are high-ticket investments, had not taken off because of the drop in pricing, and companies had internal and financial issues, she said.