Few day back Government of Jammu and Kashmir pass a bill on “Ease of Doing business bill-2026” which marks a structural transition in the Jammu and Kashmir’s administrative doctrine, shifting from traditional permission based control to rule based governance anchored in the statutory principle of “permission by exception” under section 3. There was a lot of commotion created in the media particularly in the digital media by few retired citizens about the possible fallout of the legislation passed in the Assembly. As qualified professional urban planner with more 35 year of experience on my back I cogitated it, my duty to examine the legislation and clear the doubts and trepidation among the people regarding the Act. The Jammu and Kashmir Ease of Doing Business Act, 2026, seeks to change the way government deals with entrepreneurs, investors and businesses. Designed to stimulate and infuse growth momentum private investment through expeditious process predictability and diminished compliance burden. Thus, its intentions are understandable like reducing unnecessary cumbersome procedures for permissions, end bureaucratic delays, simplify procedures and make government departments more accountable. No entrepreneur should have to run from office to office for routine approvals, nor should a citizen be left waiting indefinitely for a decision on a legitimate building proposal. But while simplifying the process is necessary, an equally important question deserves attention that in our effort to make doing business easier, are we creating conditions that could make planned development, environmental protection and public safety more difficult to enforce of implementable?
This is not an argument against the Act or against investment. Jammu and Kashmir needs employment, enterprise, infrastructure and economic opportunities. What it cannot afford is a development model in which the removal of administrative barriers gradually weakens the safeguards that protect its people, towns and natural environment. The distinction is particularly important in J&K. Our towns and cities have developed within a fragile Himalayan landscape of rivers, lakes, wetlands, forests, steep slopes and limited land suitable for construction. Floods, landslides, earthquakes and changing rainfall patterns make the consequences of poorly located or inadequately regulated development far more serious than a mere violation of building regulations. The concern, therefore, is not whether business should be made easier. It should undoubtedly. The real question is whether this can be achieved without compromising the long-term interests of society. As such Ease of doing business must mean less harassment and faster lawful approvals but not the greater freedom to disregard planning rules. This assessment examines the provisions as described enactment.

From Permission-Based Control to Permission by Exception

The Act seeks to move away from a system in which businesses require multiple permissions towards one that relies more heavily on prescribed rules, self-certification, third-party verification and time-bound decisions. There is considerable merit in this approach. When requirements are clear and objective, applicants should not have to seek repeated approval for matters that can be verified automatically. Unnecessary NOCs should be eliminated, and officials who delay legitimate applications should be held accountable. However, urban development is not simply a matter of completing paperwork. A building may satisfy technical requirements and still be inappropriate for its location. A commercial establishment may be permissible in principle but unsuitable for a congested residential street. An industrial activity may meet specified conditions but place excessive pressure on local water supplies, drainage or road infrastructure. This is where the distinction between procedural simplification and substantive planning becomes important. Planning regulations are not merely obstacles placed in the way of development. They exist to ensure that individual decisions do not create larger problems for the surrounding community. A road, drainage channel, wetland or residential neighbourhood cannot be assessed solely from the perspective of one applicant. The challenge before the government is to remove unnecessary bureaucracy while retaining the ability to determine where development should occur, how much a location can accommodate and what safeguards are necessary.

Self-Certification

The supplied analysis indicates that certain categories of buildings may proceed without conventional approval from a competent authority, subject to self-certification or certification by an empanelled professional. This can be a sensible reform for straightforward, low-risk construction. It can save time, reduce the workload of public authorities and encourage professionals to take greater responsibility for their work. But there is a difference between certifying a building plan and deciding whether a proposed development is suitable for its location. An architect or engineer may certify that drawings meet prescribed standards. That does not necessarily establish whether the access road can accommodate additional traffic, whether the drainage network can handle increased runoff, whether sufficient sewerage capacity exists or whether the site is affected by flooding or other environmental constraints. These are broader planning questions, and they cannot always be answered through building-plan certification alone. There is also the question of accountability. When government scrutiny is reduced, greater responsibility rests with the owner and the professionals who certify the proposal. If a serious violation is discovered after construction, the authorities must be able to establish who was responsible and ensure that the consequences are addressed. For this system to work, professional certification must be backed by transparent empanelment, independent audits, appropriate liability, strict action against fraudulent certification and publicly accessible records. Self-certification should simplify routine construction, not become a convenient route for avoiding essential planning scrutiny.

Deemed Approval

One of the most consequential features described in the Act is deemed approval. If an authority fails to decide within the prescribed period, approval may be generated through the online system. The reasoning behind this provision is understandable. Government departments should not be allowed to delay legitimate projects indefinitely. Applicants deserve certainty, and administrative inaction must have consequences. Yet a difficult question remains: what happens when a decision is delayed because a proposal requires genuine technical examination? Imagine a commercial project in Srinagar that satisfies the prescribed building dimensions but has inadequate road access, insufficient drainage or unresolved land-use concerns. If the authority fails to respond within the deadline, should its silence automatically be treated as confirmation that all relevant requirements have been satisfied? The answer must depend on the nature of the application and the legal requirements involved. For routine, low-risk proposals that meet clearly defined conditions, deemed approval may be reasonable. But it should not override statutory prohibitions, mandatory environmental clearances, essential fire-safety requirements or other legally required permissions. The government should distinguish between applications that require only routine verification and those involving complex technical, environmental or public-safety considerations. A missed deadline should trigger escalation, accountability and a transparent explanation for the delay. It should not automatically erase a substantive legal requirement. The objective must be to make government responsive without allowing administrative silence to create risks for the public.

The Three-Year Approval Period and Restrictions on Inspection

The Act describes an In-Principle Approval valid for three years, within which regular approvals must be obtained. It also refers to restrictions on inspections and coercive action during that period, subject to specified exceptions. An In-Principle Approval can provide useful certainty to an investor before substantial money is committed. However, it must be clear that preliminary approval is not necessarily permission to begin construction, occupy a building or commence an activity requiring additional statutory clearances. The distinction matters because construction, once undertaken, can be difficult and expensive to reverse. A building erected in a drainage channel, on a vulnerable slope or in violation of essential safety requirements may create lasting consequences. The inspection provisions raise a related concern. While unnecessary inspections can become a source of harassment, inspections also help detect violations before they cause serious harm. The answer is not to return to indiscriminate inspection. It is to adopt a risk-based approach. Routine, compliant projects should not be subjected to repeated and unnecessary visits. At the same time, credible complaints involving structural safety, fire hazards, environmental damage or threats to public infrastructure must receive timely attention. The implementing rules should clarify how the inspection restrictions operate and ensure that they do not prevent lawful intervention in serious cases. Random audits and inspections at critical stages of construction should also be considered.A system that trusts applicants and professionals must still retain the ability to verify compliance where the consequences of failure could be severe.

Section 22: When Individual Approvals Begin to Weaken the Master Plan

The power described under Section 22 to relax Master Plan conditions for eligible enterprise activities raises perhaps the most serious concern from an urban-planning perspective. A Master Plan is not simply a document prepared by planners and kept in government files. It represents an attempt to organise the future growth of a settlement. It identifies areas for housing, commerce, industry, transport, public facilities, recreation and environmental protection. It also considers the relationship between land use, infrastructure, and accessibility and population growth. When a Master Plan designates land for a particular use, that decision generally reflects wider considerations than the interests of an individual applicant. There is a difference between adjusting a minor technical requirement and allowing an activity that conflicts with the intended use of a location. If individual proposals can routinely secure relaxations, the planning process risks moving away from a coherent, long-term vision towards a series of decisions made project by project. Each decision may appear reasonable in isolation, yet their combined effect could fundamentally change the character of a neighbourhood or settlement. Consider a residential corridor where several commercial activities are permitted through individual relaxations. Traffic increases, parking spills onto streets, pressure on water and sewerage systems grows, and residential amenity gradually declines. No single decision may appear responsible for the overall deterioration, but the cumulative effect becomes evident over time. The same concern applies to developments affecting drainage systems, wetlands and flood-sensitive areas around Srinagar. The Negative List, as described in the Act, may prohibit certain activities in specified zones. However, the absence of a prohibition does not automatically make a proposal suitable.
A development may not be expressly prohibited and may still be inappropriate because roads are inadequate, public services are overstretched or the environmental consequences have not been properly assessed. Every proposed relaxation should therefore be examined against the applicable Master Plan, surrounding land uses, infrastructure capacity, environmental constraints and the cumulative impact of existing and proposed development. Major changes affecting the planned structure of a settlement should follow the appropriate statutory plan-modification process. Exceptional powers must remain exceptional, supported by reasons that the public can examine.

The More Serious Problem

The implications become even more significant in areas where no Master Plan exists. According to the Act, the District Empowered Committee may permit eligible activities in such areas, subject to the Negative List. This may appear to offer a practical solution for smaller towns where comprehensive planning instruments are absent. However, it creates a serious paradox: areas with the weakest planning framework may become the areas where development decisions depend most heavily on administrative discretion. The absence of a Master Plan does not mean that a town has no planning needs or that every location is suitable for development. Even an unplanned town has residential neighbourhoods, agricultural land, streams, roads, public facilities, drainage channels and environmentally sensitive areas. These features influence where development should occur, even when they have not been brought together in a comprehensive statutory plan. Without a planning framework, development may increasingly follow the availability of land and the preferences of individual investors rather than the long-term requirements of the settlement. The consequences can include scattered construction, ribbon development along highways, incompatible land uses, fragmented agricultural holdings and inadequate roads, drainage and sewerage. Once these patterns become established, correcting them is both difficult and expensive. Roads cannot always be widened after buildings have occupied the available space. Drainage channels cannot easily be restored after encroachment. Parks and public facilities are difficult to provide when every suitable parcel has already been developed. There is also a question of fairness. A town with a notified Master Plan may be constrained by its land-use provisions, while a town without one may permit comparable activities through committee decisions. The government should therefore give priority to preparing and notifying Master Plans for rapidly growing towns and emerging urban areas. Until these plans are ready, interim planning frameworks should identify settlement boundaries, existing land uses, agricultural areas, water bodies, drainage channels, flood-prone locations, forest interfaces, roads and infrastructure capacity. Development should proceed under clear interim standards rather than in a planning vacuum.

Email: ---------------------------- hamwani24@gmail.com