BRAP 2020: Assam placed in Aspirer category

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GUWAHATI, Assam: Nirmala Sitharaman, Minister of Finance and Corporate Affairs, Government of India, on Thursday, June 30, released the Business Reforms Action Plan (BRAP) 2020, in the national capital New Delhi.

This was the fifth edition of the BRAP assessment exercise. The exercise will enhance the confidence of investors, will create a business-friendly environment and improve ease of doing business through a system of competitive federalism. The states are assessed based on their performance in implementing the Business Reform Action Plan.

BRAP 2020 comprises of 301 reforms spanned over 15 business regulatory areas like Single Window System, Access to Information, Labour, Land Administration & Transfer of Land Property, Environment and Utility Permits etcetera.

Additionally, 118 new reforms were added later to further improve the process of reforms. The reforms along with 72 action points, cover 9 sectors such as trade license, legal metrology, healthcare, cinema halls, fire NOC, hospitality, telecom, tourism and movie shooting. The assessment also records the feedback from actual users at the grassroots level.

This year, states and union territories are grouped into four categories Top Achievers, Achievers, Aspirers and Emerging business Ecosystems.

The Top Achievers category includes the state of Andhra Pradesh, Haryana, Gujarat, Punjab, Karnataka, Tamil Nadu and Telangana. While, the state of Himachal Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh, Odisha, Maharashtra, Uttar Pradesh and Uttarakhand have made it to the achievers’ categories.

Assam, Chhattisgarh, Goa, Kerala, Jharkhand, Rajasthan and West Bengal are positioned in the Aspirers category. On the other hand, Chandigarh, Andaman & Nicobar, Daman & Diu, Dadra & Nagar Haveli, Bihar, Delhi, Jammu & Kashmir, Manipur, Meghalaya, Puducherry, Nagaland and Tripura are assigned Emerging Business Ecosystem category.

However, the state of Arunachal Pradesh, Sikkim and Mizoram could not be categorised due to lack of sufficient data.

Sitharaman, after releasing the report said, “The reforms now taking place are responsive reforms. Unlike the reforms of 1991, which were given to us for implementation, there is no compulsion now. The objective is to see what will bring out improvement in systems and ensure better lives for us. An element of nudge has been brought into every layer of the government. Nudging cannot be by the government only and the industry has a big role to play there.”

Piyush Goyal, Minister of Commerce & Industry, Government of India, Anurag Jain, Secretary, Department of Promotion of Industry and Internal Trade and other senior officials of state and UT were also present during the launch of BRAP 2020.