NITI Aayog should frame state ranking system for agriculture: CII

CII president Rakesh Bharti Mittal unveiled CII’s agenda for FY19 in a press conference on Thursday. Photo: HT

New Delhi: With the government planning to double farmer income in the next few years and mitigate the existing crisis in the agriculture sector, policy think tank NITI Aayog should come out with a comprehensive ranking system for states in agriculture, said Rakesh Bharti Mittal, president of the Chamber of Indian Industries (CII).

Unveiling CII’s agenda for FY19 in a press conference on Thursday, Mittal also said that if farm income in the country is to be doubled, this cannot happen without the private sector investing in the agriculture sector.

“With the ranking system in place (states should be ranked according to improvement registered in farm sector) every state is fighting with each other for investments and a similar set up should be there for agriculture as well. Since the agriculture sector is in distress these kinds of steps are probably required,” the CII president said.

The industry lobby group along with its members and the Union government will work in the domain of electric vehicles, private investment in healthcare and labour reforms to name a few, according to the president.

It has already expressed its demand for a reduction in corporate tax rate of 18% after doing away with the exemptions given by the government. The union government has reduced corporate tax for companies with a turnover of Rs250 crore .

Uday Kotak, president-designate of CII, said that the creation of the Insolvency and Bankruptcy Code (IBC) and the introduction of the goods and services tax (GST) were the biggest reforms seen by the Indian economy which would have a positive impact on the overall business environment.

“The IBC needs to be tweaked here and there and that will happen over the due course of time. Rules of bidding should be like a prospectus which will tell you how the bids will be evaluated. Also the 270 day limit should also be looked at for some companies,” Kotak, vice-president of Kotak Mahindra Bank said at the CII meet.

Recently bids placed by some companies to take over debt laden ones under IBC were rejected by lenders. Kotak argued that not allowing promoters to bid for defaulting companies will create problems in the long run if the firms are small in size and not enough suitors are available.