The Department of Industries, Chandigarh Administration, has initiated a comprehensive drive to bring 30,000 unregistered Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises (MSMEs) into the formal economy. This effort is part of the Centre’s Raising and Accelerating MSME Performance (RAMP) Programme, which aims to enhance the competitiveness and formalisation of small businesses across India.
Deputy Commissioner Highlights Benefits of Formalisation
Deputy Commissioner Nishant Kumar Yadav, who also serves as Secretary Industries, emphasised that the drive is designed to extend the advantages of formalisation to enterprises that have remained outside government oversight. “Thousands of small businesses across Chandigarh operate without any formal recognition, which keeps them out of institutional credit and government schemes. This drive will bring them into the mainstream, at their doorstep, free of cost,” he told The Tribune.
Under the initiative, unregistered MSMEs across the city—including manufacturing units, service providers, and traders—will receive assistance to obtain free Udyam Registration, the Government of India’s official MSME recognition system. Formalisation will enable these enterprises to access institutional credit and flagship schemes such as the Pradhan Mantri MUDRA Yojana (PMMY), the Credit Guarantee Fund Trust for Micro and Small Enterprises (CGTMSE), and the Prime Minister’s Employment Generation Programme (PMEGP), while also enhancing their market credibility.
Implementing Agency and On-the-Ground Facilitation
The department has engaged Forvis Mazars LLP as the implementing agency for the drive. Trained survey teams will fan out across industrial areas, commercial markets, and business clusters in the city to identify unregistered enterprises and provide free, on-the-spot facilitation for Udyam Registration. Yadav appealed to MSME owners and traders to extend full cooperation to the survey teams. “We need accurate information from business owners for this exercise to succeed. The more enterprises we register, the stronger our local economy becomes,” he added, noting that enterprises can also contact the Department of Industries directly for assistance.
Current MSME Landscape and RAMP Programme Impact
As of now, Chandigarh has 65,164 Udyam-registered units, employing nearly 4.69 lakh people. The RAMP programme, sanctioned at Rs 43.07 crore by the World Bank and running until March 2027, has already reached over 2,748 MSMEs through a dedicated facilitation helpdesk since its rollout last year. The department now aims to register nearly half as many additional units as currently exist on its books, targeting 30,000 new registrations.
Alignment with Ease-of-Doing-Business Agenda
This move is also in line with Chandigarh’s broader ease-of-doing-business agenda. The UT’s score on the Centre’s Business Reform Action Plan has risen to 89 per cent in 2025. Additionally, the administration recently proposed extending Punjab’s Right to Business Act to Chandigarh, which would give businesses statutory, time-bound clearances, further streamlining the regulatory environment.
