In offices that used to house India’s planning commission, Sanjeev Sanyal, an economic adviser to the prime minister, is pursuing what he calls “process reforms”—small tweaks to streamline government as opposed to big structural changes like overhauling the tax code.
Take the process of closing a business. In 2021 it took 499 days on average and involved placing advertisements in newspapers. By last year it took only 90. Applying for patents, too, used to be an ordeal owing to a shortage of qualified staff to review the claims. Hundreds have been hired and the number of patents granted has risen from 6,000 in 2015 to more than 100,000 last year.
Other agencies have been abolished or shrunk. Gone are the Tariff Commission, which was set up in 1951 but never set any tariffs (the commerce and finance ministries did that), the All-India Handloom Board, the All India Handicrafts Board and the Central Organisation for Modernisation of Workshops. Several film-promotion organisations, including the Directorate of Film Festivals and the Children’s Film Society, have become one.
There is much more to do. Despite heavy investment in India’s ports, ships often get stuck waiting for customs and security clearances for their cargo. It can be so hard to claim any money from the Provident Fund, the national pension scheme, that many workers see contributions as a tax rather than a form of savings. But at least there is now a process for process reforms. ■
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