Jayalalithaa died rather prematurely in spite of superb healthcare facilities available. Jaya, popularly called ‘Amma’, was an enviable political leader who amassed immeasurable wealth of all kinds, no one knows exactly how, for which she had to land in jail and lose her right to fight elections until a strange High Court order saved her. She was kind of a lady Robin Hood who splurged wealth among the poor and needy to ensure they voted her back to power continuously. Interestingly, Tamil Nadu is like the USA where principally two parties fight and occupy the throne in turn. Her fan following is so huge that at least a million followers accompanied her mortal body to her final resting place. Her best friend (temporarily enemy too) told the world that Amma hated Brahmin dominance and, as a rationalist Dravidian, expressed desire to go beneath the earth next to where the late superstar and her mentor MG Ramachandran lies under a tomb.
Amma’s on-screen and off-screen conducts were the same. She was incredibly daring and did what she thought would make the poor happy. Tamil Nadu has slipped into a political void. Naveen Patnaik and Amma were great friends. Naveen may have been inspired by her one-rupee meals, computers and bicycles for students, free water to farmers and many more sops of the sort. Her rainwater harvesting project has attracted international attention and motivated many political masters in other water-scarce regions. Jayalalithaa will certainly occupy space in history books for her controversial and dramatically chequered, yet victory-filled political career. She will be remembered as an embodiment of woman power for several strong decisions against worst odds. Naveen has lost a dear sister. He has better fan following than Amma and is superbly cleaner. Hopefully, great things would come the poor communities’ way including water, electricity, houses and dignified livelihood.
Jayalalithaa did wonders to the business environment. leading international corporates have joyously set up shops in Tamil Nadu. Motor cars, industrial goods and fantastic services outfits are all in late Amma’s State, mostly due to her indomitable political will. She did things what she believed would keep the voters, the poor masses, in good humour. Her unique sense of courage needs researching by super experts so that its findings can generate guts in countless timid masters while planning truly beneficial schemes for the deprived communities.
*Odisha has just concluded a hyped ‘Make in Odisha’ conclave, something like the ‘Vibrant Gujarat’ fanfare to attract investors from all over. Interesting findings have emerged from recent studies: Bihar, which was 21st in the last year’a ranking, is now at the top among all the States in terms of steps taken to improve ease of doing business followed by Telangana and Jharkhand on a ranking being done on real-time basis by the Department of Industrial Policy and Promotion (DIPP) on business reforms and action plans. These rankings are dynamic and may change on the basis of initiatives taken by States. Madhya Pradesh and Karnataka are fourth and fifth, respectively, in the ranking. Gujarat has fallen from the top position in terms of improved business environment and ease of doing business. The Commerce and Industry Ministry now evaluates States on 340 parameters as against 91 last year. Bihar’s claims of 29 reforms, the highest among States, have been verified. Chhattisgarh is rated very high.
The ease of doing business index was created by the World Bank Group. Higher rankings (a low numerical value) indicate better, usually simpler, regulations for businesses and stronger protections of property rights. An empirical research funded by the World Bank has come in place to justify that the economic growth impact of improving these regulations is strong including the ‘duration of court procedures’ and the ‘optimal degree of social protection’. The ease of doing business index is meant to measure regulations directly affecting businesses and does not measure more general conditions such as a nation’s proximity to large markets, quality of infrastructure, inflation, or crime. Ranking on the index is based on the average of 10 sub-indices:
Starting a business: Procedures, time, cost and minimum capital to open a new business
Dealing with construction permits: Procedures, time and cost to build a warehouse
Getting electricity: Time and cost required for a business to obtain a permanent electricity connection
Registering property: Time and cost to register commercial real estate
Getting credit: Strength of legal rights index, depth of credit information index
Protecting investors: Indices on the extent of disclosure, and director liability and ease of shareholder suits
Paying taxes: Number of taxes paid, hours per year spent preparing tax returns and total tax payable as share of gross profit
Trading across borders: Number of documents, cost and time necessary to export and import
Enforcing contracts: Time and cost to enforce a debt contract
Resolving insolvency: Time, cost and recovery rate (%) under bankruptcy proceeding
The doing business project also offers information on following datasets:
Distance to borders, distance of each economy to the “frontier,” which represents the highest performance observed on each of the indicators across all economies included in doing business
Entrepreneurship: Measures entrepreneurial activity. Data from 130 company registrars on the number of newly-registered firms over the past seven years
Good practices: Insights into how governments have improved the regulatory environment in the past
Transparency in business regulation: Data on the accessibility of regulatory information measures and how easy it is to access fee schedules for four regulatory processes in the largest business location
While fewer and simpler regulations often imply higher rankings, this is not always the case. Protecting the rights of creditors and investors, as well as establishing or upgrading property and credit registries, may mean that more regulation is needed.
Odisha has slipped four places, from seventh to eleventh, in the Government of India’s ease of doing business rankings. This comes at a time when the State is working hard to woo investors. Officials, however, said that States were judged on “paper notifications” and not on actual implementations.
The DIPP rankings, based on reforms reviewed by the World Bank, are an initiative of the Narendra Modi Government to use competitive federalism to get States to up their games. The logical end to this exercise should be to see what is being implemented on the ground and Odisha is the only State which has engaged a third party (market research firm IMRB) to check what is truly happening on the ground.
The “Make in Odisha Conclave” in Bhubaneswar has seemingly gone well. Telangana and Andhra Pradesh are considered better locations as per study.
Naveen Patnaik has been meeting business leaders who have committed investment of at least Rs 90,490 crore. Following a similar investors’ meet in Mumbai in February, Odisha had claimed commitments to the tune of Rs 70,000 crore. Ten years ago, minerals-rich Odisha was hitting headlines for its countless MoUs with corporates like Posco and Arcelor-Mittal. Both have abandoned their projects due to ‘ease of doing business’ problems.
oWhat is not discussed seriously is that ‘ease of doing business’ will eventually depend on the energy status of a State. Odisha has coal and river water dams. Yet, the price and quality of electric power are relatively high. Manufacturing or service providing will largely depend on consistent, sustainable and highly affordable power. Odisha has to work extra time to reform the power sector. Appropriate technology is yet another factor which makes it easy to employ local people in impressive numbers which brings down social strife and resistance. Tourism has tremendous potential. But the planners have to see beyond the rotten Puri-Bhubaneswar-Konark triangle. Hilly southern and western hinterland destinations can work wonders. The 480-km-long coastline will not ever match the Goa or Kerala beach tourism because the sea is calmer and more serene with less of storms and cyclones. Medical or healthcare tourism is a fabulous proposition. Pilgrimage to temple towns is declining because of rude servitor behaviour and crude greed of all involved in tourism business. Tourists love privacy and silence apart from affordable prices of goods and services and cleanliness. The Odisha administration has failed to contain plastic garbage, noisy auto-rickshaws and criminal agents in hospitality business. Western and south-western Odisha can restore vibrant tourism. Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik may consider wooing electric automobile makers from all over. Western Europe today has battery cars hauling for 350 km on one charge. But the petroleum lobby spends like mad to keep electric automobiles out of imagination in India. Farm and food processing tools and equipments are another bright idea for Odisha. Most importantly, sensitising people about industrial growth coupled with quality of life ingredients can create a lasting business environment. Or else, the ‘Make in Odisha’ call would sound ‘Get the hell out of here’ to potential investors.
(The writer is a core member of Transparency International, Odisha)