Weed out redundant laws, says Ficci

The Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce and Industry (Ficci) has come up with a multi-pronged agenda to unshackle the India Inc from the stranglehold of 450-odd economic and commercial regulations.

The agenda suggested revision of statutes to weed out redundant and outmoded laws and simplification of other laws. Ficci also called for an increase in the number of courts and judges while rationalising and minimising procedural hassles.

"The country today has about 25 judges per million Indians, which is the lowest in the world. We need to decrease this ratio only then can cases be disposed within a time frame and timely justice obtained at affordable cost," said Onkar S. Kanwar, President, Ficci.

The agenda identified a host of other areas that cry out for reforms. It proposed that the concept of plea bargaining and a sunset clause in all legislations should be introduced in India.

On the latter, the chamber suggested that the government must review the relevance of such legislation after expiry of the time period in the sunset clause. It asked the government to enact the new companies law at the earliest.

It also suggested that more cases should be referred to arbitration and other speedier dispute settlement mechanism to reduce the burden on courts.

Further it called for the scrapping of the legislation that stipulates that promoters should disinvest voting shares held by them in excess of 55 per cent.

Ficci termed the limit of 75 per cent as provided in the takeover regulations reasonable.

Kanwar said the proposals if implemented would make the Indian industry cost competitive and also boost the confidence of foreign investors.

"At a time when we are looking to streamline system and processes, and are struggling to reduce cost, companies are burdened with high litigation cost," he said.