States to be ranked in the delivery of services

The parameters suggested by the officials of the Department for Promotion of Industry and Internal Trade (DPIIT) include single-window portals for obtaining electricity, water and gas connections, driving licenses and death and marriage certificates and time-bound delivery of such- Services that are notorious for bureaucratic delays.

Mint has reviewed a copy of a presentation it made to states last week, in which the draft recommendations are yet to be finalised.

DPIIT, the nodal department for the exercise, has proposed equal weightage to both ‘Ease of Living’ and ‘Ease of Doing Business’ for the rankings.

However, some states have opposed the move, which was done in earlier budget proposals, saying they want to start with a smaller weightage to the ease-of-living rankings yet to be introduced.

“We need to create awareness about the ease of life for the citizens, which will make the survey respondents aware about it. So, it would be better if the Center agrees to a smaller weightage of living expenses this time, and gradually increase it,” said a state official.

Queries sent to the spokesperson of DPIIT on Wednesday remained unanswered till press time.

With a focus on citizens and businesses alike, the latest version of the Business Reform Action Plan (BRAP) may include ideas such as online dashboards to track applications, pending and withdrawals on a weekly, fortnightly or monthly basis. This, in turn, will reveal the number of certificates or licenses issued and the average time taken for them. E-payment of utility bills like electricity and water is one of the 94 action points.

DPIIT secretary Anurag Jain said in an interview earlier this month that the ranking of 2022 states would be done on a new “BRAP+” framework.

The proposed BRAP is expected to have 263 Action Points under Ease of Doing Business and 94 Action Points under Ease of Living, making 357 Action Points. Ease of Living includes 11 improvement areas- an online single window system, transport, employment exchange, ease of obtaining certificates, utility permits, cooking gas cylinders or pipe connections, access to the public distribution system, health care, land administration and Transfer of land and property.

DPIIT has also proposed a single window portal for property registration, birth certificate, death certificate, health card, income certificate, driving license and utility permit. Under the Ease of Doing Business, it has proposed additional reforms related to bio-medical waste management.

The ranking methodology will have three aspects – user survey by DPIIT, uploading of evidence on the website by the states and user data by the states. States will be required to upload evidence, assessment and user data between September 1 and October 2022. While the provisional rankings are targeted to be released between January 1 and 10 next year, the final positions will be announced on January 26.

Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman in her budget speech earlier this month had announced the launch of the next phase of Ease of Doing Business (EoDB 2.0) and Ease of Living.

He said that this phase will be guided by active participation of states, digitization of manual processes and interventions, integration of central and state-level systems through IT bridges, single-point access to all citizen-centric services and standardization. Removal of overlapping compliances.

States and the Center have eliminated over 25,000 compliances, and another 3,000 compliances are being reviewed for shortfalls this year.