Thriving corruption hits ‘ease of business’
There is only one state in India which allows an industry to file an online application to cut a tree (Andhra Pradesh), says a report originally published in The Indian Express. The other states do not leave even this opportunity to make the business owner visit the government offices. There are more such evidences strewn around in the Assessment of State Implementation of Business Reforms report released by the department of industrial policy and promotion under Amitabh Kant and his team.
All of them add up to a single point. The ranks of the states in their Ease of Doing Business broadly correspond with their level of corruption. To that extent one could also call this report a corruption index. One is not making a generalization. Of the 98 point action plan on which the states were assessed in the report, the answer points to one direction–how corruption free is the state
As the tree cutting example shows no state government (not even AP) will hand over an approval certificate to cut a tree, online. So it is not surprising that none of the states have scored above 75 per cent in their overall score card.
For a business person this is a sobering thought. In the list except for Gujarat, none of the top industrial destinations figure in the top five. Maharashtra and Karnataka are at the 8th and 9thposition, while Tamil Nadu is not even in the top ten. Haryana and Delhi in the NCR are even further afield.
So inspite of the centre’s push it is business as usual in most of the states which have the resources and can easily do better. That they can do better is evident from the list. The states which have pushed into the top flight are the relatively poorer states but it has taken little to clean up their act. The best example among them is Uttar Pradesh which has managed to move into the top ten
Corruption arises, as the report notes due to lack of a transparent and effective regulatory framework. The World Economic Forum’s Global Competitiveness Report ranks India at 93rd among 144 countries on irregular payments and bribes, 59th on burden of government regulation, and 57th on the efficiency of the legal framework in settling disputes.
This is where the industrially developed states need to improve upon.
Published Originally in The Indian Express