Andhra Pradesh continues to be the best state to do business while Gujarat slipped a position to rank fifth in the ease of doing business ranking prepared by the World Bank and the Department of Industrial Policy and Promotion (DIPP).
In the last year’s ranking, Andhra Pradesh had jointly topped the chart with Telangana while Gujarat was relegated to the third position from the top slot in 2015, media reports said.
According to the latest Business Reform Action Plan (BRAP) index, Telangana and Haryana are placed at second and third positions, respectively.
On the other side of the spectrum, Meghalaya, Lakshadweep and Arunachal Pradesh were ranked at the bottom for not doing anything to improve business climate, a PTI report quoted the study as pointing out.
“This time we have taken feedback from industry to see whether the reforms are percolated to the ground level,” DIPP Secretary Ramesh Abhishek said adding next year “100 per cent evaluation would be done based on feedback from industry”.
Implementation of the reforms help attract both domestic and foreign investors. Due to this exercise, states are competing with each other in improving business climate.
Indian economy would touch $10 trillion in the coming years and for that it is fundamental to make business more competitive, Abhishek reportedly said.
Other states in the top ten are Jharkhand (4), Gujarat (5), Chhattisgarh (6), Madhya Pradesh (7), Karnataka (8), Rajasthan (9) and West Bengal (10). Delhi was ranked 23rd in the chart, the PTI report highlighted.
An official statement said that a large number of states have made significant progress in reforms suggested in BRAP 2017.
The assessment is based on a combined score consisting of reform evidence score that is based on evidence uploaded by States/UTs and feedback score that is based on response garnered from actual users of services provided to businesses, reported PTI.
As many as 17 states achieved a reform evidence score of more than 90 per cent and 15 achieved a combined score of 90 per cent and more, the report said.