Bury this Bureaucrataurus

Context: Rising number of laws and the bureaucratic process involved have increased the complexities in the governance. The outdated Tariff Commission is one such example.

Case Study: An example Bureaucratic Drag

• In 1999, The Ministry of Steel submitted a formal query to the Department of Administrative reforms over the usage of green or red ink, as opposed too blue or black, used to annotate documents.
• The matter was passed to the Bureau of Printing and returned back with the recommendation that the Department of Personnel and Training be consulted. The matter took a year to resolve.
• It acts as an illustration of Parkinson’s law: which states that ‘It is a commonplace observation that work expands so as to fill the time available for its completion.’

History of Tariff Commission:

• Origin as a Tariff Board: The 1921-22 Indian Fiscal Commission, of which John Maynard Keynes was vice-president, instituted the Tariff Board.
• Aim: To make enquiries into the condition of industries and recommend whether protection should or should not be extended to them, and if extended, what the rate of protection should be.
• Tariff Commission Act of 1951: changed the board into a commission, as a consequence to Fiscal Commission’s (1949-50), recommendation.

• Repealed in 1976: based on the observation of the Second Fiscal Commission that the functions of the Commission were largely similar to those of the Bureau of Industrial Costs and Prices (BICP).
• The BICP was bifurcated in1997, and the National Pharmaceutical Pricing Authority (NPPA) was carved out and placed under the Ministry of Chemicals & Fertilizers.
• Issues involved: The Commission has been unnecessarily involved with such issues which can be taken up by other entities:
• For, E.g. the BICP conducted its last study on exemption of the Goods and Services Tax (GST) on salt-treated green mango which can be done by either the Indian Institute of Foreign Trade (IIFT) or the Research and Information System for Developing Countries (RIS).

Conclusion: Since May 2014, there has been a conscious attempt to reduce the number of laws and government institutions. Among them, one is long past its ‘best before’ date: the Tariff Commission (TC).