India should reduce red tapism for Sino industrial park

 The Dollar Business Bureau

An official media report said that India has to lessen all the unnecessary red tapes and ease visa restrictions if it needs Chinese industrial parks in the country.

An article on the website of the Global Times said, "The slow process of building parks exclusively for Chinese investors, which is partly attributed to the lengthy and tedious procedures that Chinese passport holders are required to endure to apply for Indian visas, might aggravate the imbalance in bilateral trade.”

The initiative for setting up the industrial park was the brainchild of former Prime Minister Manmohan Singh during his visit to China in October 2013 with a view to reducing the trade deficit. However, both the nations have taken up the proposal and have kept a close watch on one another’s’ initiatives which is taking shape during the Modi government.

The official data of China showed that in 2015 the total trade with India amounted to $71.64 billion, which was well below the $100 mark envisioned last year.

Last year, the trade deficit for India with China rose to $45 billion due to a plunge in exports by more than 18 percent.

The article also added, “The presence of Chinese industrial parks would also mean that more jobs would be available for the roughly 15 million young people who join India's workforce every year. All that said, India needs to cut all unnecessary red tape and smooth the process for Chinese industrial parks to be set in motion eventually.”