Nitin Jain

Tribune News Service

Ludhiana, November 11

A whopping 91 per cent clearances and services were granted online to industrialists and investors in the state within the stipulated time period during the present regime, the government has claimed.

The business first online portal of Invest Punjab — the state government’s one-stop unified regulator controlling 23 different departments to provide advanced single-window facilitation to the investors — accorded almost 78,000 mandatory nods to the industry since 2017, official figures have revealed.

Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of Invest Punjab Rajat Agarwal told The Tribune on Thursday that the end-to-end online single window system had evoked an average rating of 4.5 out of 5 from users who applied through the online portal to seek over 120 clearances and 36 fiscal incentives of 16 state departments and 2 Central agencies for setting up their base or expanding their existing units in

the state.

He said the online portal provides the facilities of e-payment, real-time monitoring and downloading of final approved certificates to applicants.

Putting an end to the inspector raj, which was considered as a tool of harassment and hardship by industrialists, the government also introduced the central inspection system to conduct joint inspections of the industrial units.

Under this system, joint inspection teams have so far conducted 17,589 inspections comprising officials from the departments of Labour, Boilers, Legal Metrology and Punjab Pollution Control Board (PPCB).

Agarwal said the system entails computerised random selection of establishment and officer for inspection, online uploading of inspection reports within 48 hours and risk-based inspections of industrial units in the state.

He said taking a step ahead to further improve the ease of doing business and facilitate investors to set up their shops and existing industrialists to expand their existing units in the state, the government had taken an in-principle decision to seek no new no objection certificate (NOC) for granting any statutory clearances. “In case any new NOC will be required in the future, a formal approval of the Council of Ministers will be needed,” said the Invest Punjab CEO, while adding that it would help reduce cost and time of compliances mandatory for industrialists.