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Business News/ Politics / Policy/  World Bank or DIPP: Whose report is it anyway?
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World Bank or DIPP: Whose report is it anyway?

Last week, trade minister Nirmala Sitharaman sought to 'clarify' the matter, saying the DIPP had only provided its inputs for the survey

A file photo of Nirmala Sitharaman. Pradeep Gaur/MintPremium
A file photo of Nirmala Sitharaman. Pradeep Gaur/Mint

New Delhi: The report on implementation of business regulatory reforms by state governments initiated by the department of industrial policy and promotion (DIPP) had become controversial even before its release on Monday, with the National Democratic Alliance (NDA) government unwilling to take ownership of it.

That’s because the government was concerned that it may lead to a political slugfest ahead of the Bihar assembly elections in October-November.

Last week, commerce and industry minister Nirmala Sitharaman sought to “clarify" the matter, saying the DIPP had only provided its inputs for the survey.

“The World Bank, together with a professional agency, is dealing with it. The government of course gave its inputs. The ranking is being done by them," Sitharaman said.

On Monday, at the release of the study, there was little sign of the DIPP being party to the report, forget being the key driver. The additional secretary in the department, Shatrughna Singh, present on the stage in the absence of secretary Amitabh Kant, complimented the World Bank and KPMG for “producing a thoroughly professional report on an extremely difficult subject".

Singh did not answer any questions from the audience, which were fielded by representatives of industry and World Bank country director Onno Ruhl.

The cover had logos of the World Bank Group, KPMG, the Confederation of Indian Industry (CII) and the Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce and Industry (Ficci), and the now ubiquitous Make In India logo.

The report contained a foreword written by Ruhl. In fact, Ruhl thanked DIPP officials for their support in preparing the report. “On behalf of all the partners of this report, we would like to thank Shri Amitabh Kant, secretary, DIPP; Shri Shatrughna Singh, additional secretary, DIPP; Shri Shailendra Singh, joint secretary, DIPP; and Shri Ravinder, director, DIPP, for their continuous and unwavering support and encouragement in conducting this mammoth exercise," he wrote in the foreword.

Replying to a question, Ruhl said: “The report is a partnership between CII, Ficci, DIPP, World Bank with KPMG as the knowledge partner. We certainly are willing to continue that partnership and do this on a yearly basis, and that, I think, is the intent of all."

A World Bank presentation made at the event showed that the World Bank came into the picture of the survey only in August when it reviewed the “dataset to ensure robustness and veracity".

Replying to a questionnaire before the release of the report, a World Bank spokesperson claimed the bank did provide inputs to KPMG for an early draft of the methodology used for this assessment.

“The bank provided inputs into the methodology of the survey, which was carried out by KPMG. Once the survey was completed, we reviewed the dataset with KPMG to ensure its veracity and robustness. Further, our business regulation experts, both globally and in Delhi, provided technical inputs to help explain why specific business reforms assessed were important for India," he stated.

A DIPP official, on condition of anonymity, admitted that the government did sponsor the study and that the World Bank only provided technical assistance for finalizing the report.

“This year, they didn’t charge us any money. We have requested them to conduct the survey for next three years and publish the report of their own. For that, we have to pay them," he added.

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Published: 15 Sep 2015, 07:37 AM IST
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