This State amends its Industries Facilitation Act to strengthen Ease of Doing Business

On Friday, the Govt of Karnataka amended the long pending industrial reform “The Karnataka Industries (Facilitation) Act, 2002”  to facilitate & attract investment in the state. The decision was taken by the state Cabinet meeting held on Friday & chaired by Karnataka CM BS Yediyurappa.  

Currently, only Gujarat & Rajasthan are the 2 states in India that have amended this Act for small scale industries only. In our state the amended act includes small, medium & large scale industries.

Under the amended Act, an industry would not need any statutory permissions for the first three years, or whichever is earlier to set up operations in the state. These permissions include approvals from under multiple state laws, including trade licence & building-plan approval, measures that would save lot of time & cost for industries.  

The objective of the amended Act is to simplify regulations & reduce procedural requirements & create a conducive investment environment.

Economies worldwide are seeing a slow transition & will require a longer period to restore the pre-COVID normalcy levels. In midst of these sobering business environment, the Karnataka State Cabinet cleared the (Facilitation) Act, 2002.  This Act has been a long-pending demand by the investors & will usher in investments to the state in coming days.
   
During a media briefing held today at Bengaluru, Jagdish Shettar, Minister for Large & Media Scale Industries Said - “This decision was taken today in the cabinet under the leadership of CM BS Yediyurappa & I thank all my cabinet colleagues for this progressive move. This is a historic decision taken for the benefit of the industrial sector. This decision has been undertaken as the Govt wants to promote Ease of Doing Business & facilitate investors to invest in the state.

In the past, numerous procedures & clearances have resulted in delay of setting up industries & escalated the project cost for the investors, thus resulting in a huge economic toll & delayed investment to the state. Keeping that in mind, the newly amended Act shall ensure the investors are insulated by the delays.

In order to kick-start the economic activity post-COVID-19, the Govt of Karnataka in the last few weeks has stressed on Ease of Doing Business, with single window for investors, simplified processes, regular consultation with Industry, stable policy-driven.  The state has also simplified land & labour laws to promote Karnataka as an investment destination.

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