The World Bank on Tuesday ranked India 100th out of 190 countries in its Ease of Doing Business ranking for 2018. India has jumped 30 places from its 130th rank in the 2017 report. The country was ranked 142nd in the report for 2014.
The country has been ranked 29th on the ease of getting electricity connection, 29th on the ease of getting credit and fourth in protecting minority investors.
In a press release, the World Bank said that India is one of the “top 10 improvers” in the 2018 ranking, because it has implemented reforms in eight out of 10 indicators on the Doing Business ranking. The release said India has improved its business regulations in “absolute terms”, and has thus improved its score on the “distance to frontier” metric in the Doing Business rankings from 56.05 to 60.75.
However, India is ranked a poor 156th on the parameter of starting a business, and 181st on granting construction permits in the 2018 report. Its ranking in paying taxes is 119th, for enforcing contracts 164th and 103rd in resolving cases of insolvency.
“Tackling these challenging reforms will be key to India sustaining the momentum towards a higher ranking,” World Bank India Director Junaid Ahmad said in reference to the parameters on which India performed poorly. “To secure changes in the remaining areas will require not just new laws and online systems but deepening the ongoing investment in the capacity of states and their institutions to implement change and transform the framework of incentives and regulation facing the private sector.”
Centre hails ranking
Finance Minister Arun Jaitley hailed India’s rise in the rankings, and said the government was committed to more reforms to improve it further.
“The exceptional pace of reforms in India under Prime Minister Narendra Modi is evidenced by India moving 30 ranks up,” Jaitley tweeted. “Economic reforms start bearing fruit with passage of time, and the government’s stand on India’s road map for growth has been vindicated.”
Jaitley added that India’s ranking would improve further once the reforms in enforcement of contracts are implemented. He said that the implementation of the Goods and Services Tax will further improve India’s ranking.
“Prime Minister Narendra Modi is committed to bringing in transformative change in India’s economic landscape,” Union Commerce and Industry Minister Suresh Prabhu said in a video on Twitter. “He wants to ensure that when India reaches 75 years of Independence five years later, it will be a completely different country.”
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