Govt plans 3 days registration process for companies

The government is working on a plan to further simplify the process and shorten the time period for the incorporation of a company.

Under the new system, a single clearance with seamless registration of Permanent Account Number, Tax Account Number, Goods and Services Tax, Employee Provident Fund Organisation and Employee State Insurance Corporation, will lead to the completion of the process in flat three days.

With these measures, the Department for Promotion of Industry and Internal Trade (DPIIT) hopes the country shall scale up in the Ease of Doing Business ranking to enter the top 50, says a report appearing in ET.

There are, however, some teething issues which have to be taken care of. There are glitches in name reservation that is being sorted out by the MCA. Here the involvement of multiple agencies delays the clearance process. A seamless process is being proposed for registration with all central agencies being brought under a single layer.

Also, an alternative to authentication in place of digital signatures is proposed as a step to speed up registration.

In the World Bank ease of doing business index released in October last year, India had jumped 23 points to occupy 77th place. In the last two years, the country has climbed 53 notches as the government put special efforts in removing bottlenecks for businesses.

India’s effort in the direction also led to World Bank recognising India as one of the top improvers for the year. But it has a long way to go before it can catch up with China which is ranked at 46 place, the US (4) or even Singapore (2).

The indicators for the ranking that are taken into consideration by World Bank are starting a business, getting electricity, dealing with construction permits, getting credit, paying taxes and trading across borders.

The DPIIT has to cover a lot of ground in insolvency framework, ease of property registration, payment and refund of taxes and enforcement of contracts before it can really look forward to improving India’s ranking further.