New Delhi: Obtaining an “eating house license” from Delhi Police needs more documents than those for procuring a gun suggesting how tough it is to do business in India.
Noting the difficulty in starting a new venture in India, the Economic Survey 2019-20 has said that Delhi and Kolkata require a ‘Police Eating House License’ and the number of documents for getting the permit is 45.
Compared to this, documents required for a license to procure new arms and major fireworks are 19 and 12, respectively.
According to the National Restaurants Association of India (NRAI), a total of 36 approvals are required to open a restaurant in Bengaluru, Delhi requires 26, and Mumbai 22.
The ease of doing business remains a major concern in the country despite India leap-frogging to 63rd position in 2019 from 143 in 2014 in the World Bank’s Doing Business rankings.
India continues to trail in parameters such as Ease of Starting Business (rank 136), Registering Property (rank 154), Paying Taxes (rank 115), and Enforcing Contracts (rank 163).
It takes roughly 58 days and costs on an average 7.8 per cent of a property’s value to register it, and 1,445 days for a company to resolve a commercial dispute through a local first-instance court.
While setting up a manufacturing unit is tedious task given that it needs to conform with 6,796 compliance items, exporting a product is not less complex if not equally difficult.
A study found that an apparel consignment going from Delhi to Maine (US) takes roughly 41 days, but 19 of these are spent within India due to delays in transportation, customs clearance, ground handling and loading at sea-ports.
The process flow for imports, ironically, is more efficient than that for exports! In contrast, however, the imports and exports of electronics through Bengaluru airport was found to be world class.
“The processes of Indian airports should be adapted and replicated in sea-ports,” the Economic Survey tabled in Parliament on Friday said.
