The CII representation two years ago listed 37 provisions affecting company law, the insolvency and bankruptcy code, environmental, consumer protection and labor law. The second set, created in 2021, included laws such as the Competition Act, the Consumer Protection Act, the Patent Act, the Trademark Act and the Legal Metrology Act. The latest document, presented earlier this year, advocated broader “restrictions” on crime and covered changes in the Code of Civil Procedure, the Code of Criminal Procedure and the IPC. The statute of limitations involves setting the maximum time from the alleged infringement in which the parties must take legal action.

While the ORF study found most prison sentences in labor law (50 such clauses per law), the CII observations went far beyond labor law. “The issue of decriminalization needs to be addressed with a broader agenda to unburden the judicial system and make the courts more efficient. There is also a need to reduce the pendency and burden on the courts to expedite appeals and ensure only the guilty are punished,” says Chandrajit Banerjee, Director General, CII.

The changes are in progress. “A crime is a crime. When people talk about decriminalization, what they mean is replacing imprisonment with fines. Also, you’ll find that most of these clauses come from labor codes that have already been revised and unified under Four Labor Codes,” says Bibek Debroy, Chair of EAC-PM. That’s not enough. A recent EAC-PM study found , that labor law reforms were largely focused on the manufacturing sector, but will not impact the new urban economy, largely service-based.It noted that alongside labor law, infrastructure, education and law and order will also affect employment and the industrial According to Debroy, any meaningful discussion of criminal provisions in business law should also include state laws such as the Shops and Facilities Act, the Excise Duty Act, the Land Acts, etc. “You have to look at all of them,” he says, adding that there are also systemic problems. “You have to wait two years for bail. If you replace that with a civil suit, the case will drag on for 30 years under the current court system. So there is no credibility of the civil justice system. Until we don’t see how we’re going to solve this. Second, if you look at the US, civil compensation is a penalty, it’s huge, not the small sums of money like our approach to compensation.