PAN Number to be Unique Identifier for Business to Access NSWS Clearance

December 6, 2022

Union Minister of Commerce Piyush Goyal recently announced the Central Government is mulling allowing businesses to use their permanent account number (PAN) as a unique identifier for accessing the national single window system (NSWS) to receive different clearances and approvals from central and state governments.

What is NSWS?

The national single window system (NSWS) is being developed by the Department for Promotion of Industry and Internal Trade (DPIIT) as a one-stop shop for investors to apply for various approvals from central and state governments.
It will act as a single online interface that can be used by businesses to identify, seek and track clearances from various government entities.
The system will provide the required information for receiving various government permits for setting up and running a business facility.
This will ease the process of setting up units for businesses.
So far, the NSWS has received some 76,000 applications and requests. Of these, over 48,000 approvals had been granted through this system.
Businesses are mainly seeking permits under different government policies like vehicle scrappage policy, ethanol policy, hallmarking of jewellery and Petroleum and Explosives Safety Organization (PESO) approvals.
The NSWS is expected to be expanded further to include other areas like all inspection approvals, country of origin approvals, and export promotion council applications.

Why is the NSWS necessary?

The current system forces investors to run from one department to another and submit same sets of information across different platforms for obtaining permits.

This complicated and ineffective process creates delays and makes application process cumbersome. This has discouraged large multinational corporations from investing in India or scaling their operations within the country. Such challenges have prevented the Indian economy from realizing its full potential.

The NSWS seeks to address these issues and ensure ease of doing business in India.

Use of PAN number

The Central Government is currently considering permitting businesses to use PAN number as a unique identifier for accessing NSWS to receive different government clearances and approvals from central and state governments. PAN can be used to obtain basic information about the company, its directors, addresses, etc. It is expected to further ease and speed up the approval process by automatically populating other application forms received in the system.

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