All business clearances can be given within 24 hours if States work towards increasing the ease of doing business through reforms and all departments that give approvals work efficiently with a new mind-set, a top official of the Industry Department has said.

“The country can move up from 134th rank to 50th rank (in global ranking for ease of doing business). If States put their mind to it, it will take only a month,” Department of Industrial Policy and Promotion Secretary Amitabh Kant said at seminar of ‘Digitisation of process for setting up of business’ organised by FICCI.

Kant said several States including Gujarat, Maharashtra and Tamil Nadu are following best practices to improve ease of doing business which other States should adopt and implement.

The Secretary added that if 26 departments of the Government (which investors in a city like Mumbai have to approach to get clearances for their projects) work with a new mindset and there is enough administrative will in States, businesses should be able to get a clearance within 24 hours.

It takes approximately 186 days to get clearances in India while in many other countries it takes from 1 day to 10 days. India has slipped three positions to 134th spot in the latest ‘ease of doing business’ list brought out by the World Bank, which is topped by Singapore.

State Governments should devise effective mechanism so that an entrepreneur gets faster approvals and clearances for manufacturing units and projects, Kant said.

There should only be one single form to be filled which would go to different departments for clearance. “It should be totally digital and entrepreneurs should be required to pay at only one place,” he added.

Speaking on the occasion, Anil Swarup, Additional Secretary, Project Monitoring Group in the Cabinet Secretariat, said that by March 2015, almost every application, both with regard to clearances and approvals, was expected to be online.

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