Ease of Doing Business: Odisha to post policies, seek feedback online

The state government has mandated that the draft policies will be posted online

For effective implementation of Ease of Doing Business, the Odisha government will post all the draft policies, statutes and regulations and seek feedback online.

It is part of the state’s endeavour to improve the business eco-system of the state to facilitate the investors for setting up and running their business.

The state government has mandated that the draft policies, statutes and regulations impacting the investors will be posted online by the respective department in their websites to seek feedback of stakeholders and public comments.

“The respective departments will subsequently make arrangements to publish the comment and feedback received online on the draft polices, regulations and statutes and how they are addressed in the final version”, said an official source.

The Odisha government is taking several unique measures to provide congenial atmosphere to woo the investors.

In a first, the state government is also coming up with a single portal that will cater to the whole gamut of approvals needed by investors to set up shop in the state. This portal to replace the existing E-Biz portal is designed to track the entire stage of an investment – from proposal to production and also post allotment issues.

Under this portal, 50 services would go online — they include key approvals for land, water and electricity. Once the portal goes live, it promises to overcome existing hassles and make life easy for investors and catapult Odisha at the next ratings on ‘Ease of Doing Business’.

With a single portal in place, the investors need not visit the applications of individual departments.

At the last ranking of states on ‘Ease of Doing Business’, Odisha recorded 92.5% compliance with the business reforms. Still, it was placed in the 11th slot. Chopra feels the focus should be more on the implementation of the listed reforms rather than having notifications on paper.

Keeping to its thrust on the implementation of reforms, Odisha has decided to go for a third-party assessment of the reforms.

At the roadshows in Mumbai and Bengaluru and the showpiece ‘Make in Odisha’ conclave, Odisha has drawn investment intents totalling Rs 3.6 lakh crore from 124 projects. Seventy-four (74) of these projects across sectors have translated into firm commitments where the combined investments amount to Rs 2.02 lakh crore. Employment potential envisaged for the committed investments is assessed at 104,573.