UP slips on business reforms table, but improves score by 100%

UP over last year pertained to access to information and transparency enablers, single window system, availability of land etc

Uttar Pradesh (UP), which slipped in the 2016 business reforms ranking of Indian states/Union Territories (UT), has a silver lining in its score improving by almost 100% over last year.

In 2015, UP was ranked 10th in the Ease of Doing Business table with a score of about 45%. In the latest rankings, although UP slipped to 14th rank, the state saw its score rising to almost 85% nonetheless.

"The important point in the latest rankings is that UP has been able to improve its score, which is an achievement," a senior state government official and close aide of chief minister Akhilesh Yadav told Business Standard on anonymity.

He exuded confidence that UP would be able to notch up 100% score due to its single window system and other mechanisms for ensuring transparency and speed in business processes.

Amongst the top reforms undertaken by UP over last year pertained to access to information and transparency enablers, single window system, availability of land, construction permit enablers and environmental registration enablers.

The latest rankings announced recently by union commerce and industry minister Nirmala Sitharaman, are based on 340-point Business Reform Action Plan (BRAP) for the states/UTs covering the period from July 1, 2015, to June 30, 2016.

BRAP included recommendations for reforms on 58 regulatory processes, policies, practices/procedures spanning 10 reform areas spanning the lifecycle of a typical enterprise.

World Bank and the central government's Department of Industrial Policy & Promotion (DIPP) were involved in the process of reviewing data submitted by the respective states/UTs.

UP notched up 284 points out of 340, while the state was found lacking on 52 counts. For the remaining four points, the information from the state could not be made available for analysis.

Andhra Pradesh and Telangana had jointly topped the 2016 list, relegating last year's topper Gujarat to the third slot. The report had said the results demonstrated that states had increasingly risen to addressing the challenge of making it easier to do business. Besides, the national implementation average stood at about 49%, significantly higher than last year's average of 32%.

The grey areas of UP in ranking parameters related to issues of labour, change of land use, digitisation of land records, mutation, setting up of specialised courts to resolve commercial disputes.