New Delhi, Oct. 6 -- Delayed payments are a Rs.28,000-crore problem for India's micro, small, and medium enterprises (MSMEs). That's the amount they have sought to claw back from debtors, including other businesses and even the government.

After passing the MSME Development Act in 2006, the government created a network of facilitation centres across the country, governed by states, to look into each of these cases and resolve them quickly.

Now, with the advent of online dispute resolution (ODR), the government has created a portal that brings together MSMEs that haven't received payments for over 45 days, the businesses that owe them, and private-sector ODR service providers to resolve these disputes. This portal, inaugurated in June by...