Bureaucrats must take decisions to speed up growth

A special cell in the Cabinet Secretariat to monitor project clearances has launched a new portal to help corporates track project approvals. Such initiatives are incremental, even if they help improve transparency.

The Cabinet Committee on Investment (CCI) is supposed to increase the speed at which ministries clear project proposals. Even the CCI cannot stand in for, say, the ministry of environment and forest to give clearance for a project that has been stalling, but only nudge the line ministry to take a decision either way and explain the rationale for its decision.

The special cell reportedly hopes to take up specific issues that are holding up projects. But the question is, will the ministries fall in line, and that too from a cell playing second fiddle to the CCI? More bureaucratic procedures cannot revive investment.

True, there should be greater coordination among ministries that are at loggerheads over project clearances. But individual ministries and bureaucrats manning these ministries should be held accountable if they fail to take a decision on a project that determines the pace of India’s growth.

Their job is to present facts of the case on which a decision is taken and take responsibility for the authenticity of their findings. There should be a system of norms and clear-cut timetables for decision-making.

Only then can investor confidence be restored in India. Accelerating projects held up for want of forest clearance will boost growth and provide more scope for environmental protection going ahead.

Work should also be speeded up in the infrastructure corridor connecting Delhi and Mumbai to build highways, ports, airports and new cities. The government must lead the way and step up public investment. It will reassure the private sector to resume investment.