India set to climb up in ease of doing business ranking

NEW DELHI: India has told the World Bank that it has improved processes for granting construction permits sufficiently to pip the current topper, New Zealand, in the next edition of the Doing Business report.

Now it takes only 60 days following eight online procedures to get a construction permit in Delhi and Mumbai, which are taken into account for India’s ranking in the annual ease of doing business report, government officials told a team of the World Bank last week. In New Zealand, it takes 93 days and 10 procedures to get a construction permit, officials said.

India was ranked 185 among 190 nations surveyed on the parameter of getting a construction permit in the study conducted last year. Until last year it took 164 and 213 days in Mumbai and Delhi respectively to get a construction permit. The number of procedures required was as high as 42 and 29 in the two cities last year. The World Bank had then pointed out that India had not managed to shift online its construction permits system.

“The World Bank officials will speak to the users in the course of this week to vet our claims. Radical improvement has been undertaken,” a senior official told ET, requesting not to be identified. The World Bank officials will visit Delhi and Mumbai during the week to gather industry and government feedback. India has been ranked 130 in the 2017 Ease of Doing Business Index, an improvement of just one spot.




Out of 10 parameters last year India’s rank improved in four and worsened in five. India is aiming for a quantum leap of 80 spots next year to rank among the world’s top 50 countries for ease of doing business.

The government has written to the World Bank refuting several findings of last year’s report in areas such as enforcing contracts. “A lot of the reforms that were undertaken were not taken into account by the study but hopefully we should be able to reap the benefit this year,” the senior official said. He said the government is confident that if the current provisions are recognised and stand the scrutiny of the World Bank, India’s rank would considerably improve.