World Bank’s Ease Doing Business Index

World Bank’s EASE OF DOING BIZ INDEX and major reform steps taken by Indian government

 

India’s rank in ease of doing business remained unchanged at 130th out of 190 countries in the World Bank’s latest report. So, central government ministries & departments have been asked to analyze World Bank’s latest report on ease of doing business.

Departments have been asked to pursue regular engagements with stakeholders to receive feedback / inputs. Government has been making efforts to further improve the index aiming to bring the country in top 50.

EASE OF CUSTOMS CLEARANCE WITH NO PAPER DOCUMENTS

Importers and exporters will not have to submit paper documents like GAR 7 form, challans, trans-shipment permits, shipping bills and bills of entry to banks, customs ports and DGFT for customs clearance from December 2016. This welcomed move is as a part of efforts by government to improve the ease of doing business helping importers / exporters to move towards electronic messaging and paper – free transaction as these documents can be viewed on the ICEGATE e-payment Gateway, so print-outs are not required.

Trans-shipment permit information is sent electronically to the carrier, the transporter undertaking the trans-shipment, the custodian of the gateway port and the ICES system at the destination ICD or port thus, its physical print out also will not be required.

It has also been decided to discontinue the printing of Exchange control copy of bill of entry.

The customs department is also moving towards a paperless regime and doing away with submission of certain documents physically by importers / exporters from 1ST December 2016.

According to the CBEC circular, importers / exporters will henceforth not be required to submit paper documents such as:

– GAR 7 forms / TR 6 Challans,

– Trans-shipment Permit (TP),

– Shipping Bill (Exchange Control copy and Export Promotion copy) &

– Bill of Entry (Exchange Control Copy)

to Banks / DGFT / Customs Ports etc places.

CBEC provides copies of the digitally signed Shipping Bill to DGFT and also the data of Shipping Bill is integrated with the EDPMS (Export Data Processing and Monitoring System) of RBI. Therefore, printing of the EC copy and EP copy of the Shipping Bill for manual submission will not longer be required.

In IDPMS (Import Data Processing and Monitoring System), banks will not be required to obtain a physical copy of Bill of Entry from the importer as an evidence of import because data can be transferred in secured manner from the system of Customs department to IDPMS. This is the reason to discontinue the printing of Exchange control copy of Bill of Entry.

Eight Steps To Push Up India’s EASE OF DOING BUSINESS

1. An eBiz portal being made mandatory for starting a business, to be implemented by January 2017. eBiz portal shall be mandated for starting a business which shall include 3 services of Ministry of Corporate Affairs,

registration for PAN (Permanent Account Number) and TAN (Tax Deduction and Collection Account Number) and
EPFO (Employees Provident Fund Organisation) and
ESIC (Employees’ State Insurance Corporation),”

2. Ministry of Corporate Affairs, CBDT and Ministry of Labour and Employment will work towards reducing the number of procedures for starting a business to 4 days and the number of days to start a business also to 4;

3. Shram Suvidha Portal shall be the only portal for filing returns, challan and making online payment for EPFO and ESIC;

4. Department of Revenue and Ministry of Shipping shall work towards increasing the number of direct delivery consignments to 40% by end of this month. The cost and time to export and import gets reduced substantially;

5. Ministry of Corporate Affairs shall work with the concerned stakeholders so that provisions recently enabled under Insolvency and Bankruptcy Code are implemented through National Company Law Tribunal (NCLT);

6. To improve the country’s rank in the indicator ‘getting credit’, Department of Financial Services and Ministry of Corporate Affairs shall work towards creating a single registry of assets;

7. The initiative of eCourts should be expedited for electronic filing of complaints, summons and payments, especially in the commercial courts; and

8. On ‘construction permit’, the procedures shall be brought down to 8 which will be completed within 60 days.

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