India’s department for promotion of industry and internal trade (DPIIT), ministry of commerce and industry, has chaired a critical review meeting, aiming to extend the adoption and effective utilisation of the PM GatiShakti National Master Plan (NMP) and State Master Plans (SMP) across states and Union Territories (UTs) in India for ease of doing business.
Special secretary (Logistics), DPIIT, Sumita Dawra emphasised that states and UTs must align their state logistics policies (SLPs) with the national logistics policy (NLP) to bring a holistic focus on logistics at the state level. She noted that 22 states have already notified their SLPs, ministry of commerce and industry said in a press release.
The special secretary underlined the immense potential of PM GatiShakti in facilitating ease of doing business alongside ‘ease of logistics’. By integrating existing development programmes with the GIS-based NMP/SMP, states and UTs could significantly improve planning and decision-making processes, directly impacting the business environment.
She cited benefits such as optimised route planning, which could enable more efficient transport and logistics; enhanced visibility, which could facilitate better planning by revealing interactions with different sectors; and time and cost efficiency in project planning through the use of digital surveys on the NMP to prepare detailed project reports (DPR) with higher accuracy.
The DPIIT strongly recommended that states and UTs focus on establishing regular meetings and workings of institutional mechanisms at their respective levels, ensuring the quality of data layers on the NMP/SMP portals, and actively using the SMP for project planning and implementation.
The meeting saw active participation from states and UTs such as Maharashtra, Goa, Rajasthan, Daman and Diu, Dadra and Nagar Haveli, Gujarat, Madhya Pradesh, and Chhattisgarh.