Sensitizing Inspectors and Officers to facilitate EODB: Inputs Sought
Kindly review them and help identify highly specific solutions that must be implemented at policy and enforcement levels. This includes sensitizing inspectors and field officers and holding them accountable to Government policies and rules. From a business standpoint, this is where rubber meets the road and addressing this will have a direct impact on ease/cost of doing business, FDI, economic growth, jobs creation and prosperity of India
We look forward to your inputs!
Inspector Raj in India - Root Causes
1.The inspectors have a lot of power vested in them
2.Inspectors think that there is no one above them
3.They like to be shown importance in whatever they do
4.They put in unnecessary road blocks so that they could ask for bribes
5.Inspectors think that it is their right to take bribes
6.Inspectors collude with businessmen and get a monthly amount so that they do not interfere in their business
7.If bribes are not paid, then the businesses will have to run from pillar to post for the licenses
8.In many departments, there are no processes defined for inspections
9.There are no time limits defined for the inspectors to work on a particular kind of a case
10.A corrupt officer/inspector is rarely convicted in our country
11.The guidelines issued by these departments are tough to interpret for the common citizen/business, which gives an upper hand to the inspectors
12.Decades old laws & bye-laws have not been updated to suit the current business scenario
13.Business men prefer to bribe inspectors & officers or keep them on monthly/yearly payroll to avoid complications
14.Inspectors' reports are accepted without verification of correctness
15.Businesses become preys of the inspectors out of greed to earn more profit in illegal ways
16.There is a good bit of political pressure on the inspectors and many times they are collection agents for a long chain of corrupt officials and politicians
17.Many businessmen, entrepreneurs are not aware of multiplicity of various complex forms
18.Not much action can be taken against any inspector by complaints and it only causes bottlenecks/delays in projects/approvals for a business.
19. The Central or State Government makes policies and rules but no training, awareness, dissemination of the same happens at the inspector level
Inspector Raj in India – Key Issues
1.When businesses apply for licenses or permissions, they are at the mercy of the inspectors to complete the paperwork
2.They unnecessarily come up with objections while issuing certificates
3.Businessmen are harassed and bribes are demanded
4.Inspectors for fire, labour, pollution, quality, excise, weights & measures almost always engage in bribes
5.Inspectors specific to different industries like drug inspector, transport inspector etc have fixed rates per month or per transaction
6.The inspections done by the inspectors are arbitrary and based on the whims and fancy of the officials
7.Reports are never transparent
8.They work on cases at their own pace and don’t care about the suffering of the general public
9.Inspectors manhandle the detainees at the police station
10.Inspector don’t let honest people do their work honestly
11.Police and Municipal inspectors put pressure on individuals to stop construction till their palms are greased
12.In many cases, inspectors facilitate corruption for a chain of officials in the hierarchy and act as collection agents. more