Mumbai, Nov. 5 -- In a sweeping shift toward citizen-friendly governance, Maharashtra has embarked on an ambitious legal reform drive aimed at removing the threat of jail time for minor administrative and procedural lapses.
The state's latest decriminalisation push signals its intention to move away from punitive regulation and toward a compliance-centric approach - a model designed to build trust between the state and its citizens while accelerating economic activity.
For decades, entrepreneurs, small traders, professionals and even ordinary citizens have lived with the fear that technical mistakes - a clerical error in a form, a delay in renewing a licence, or a missing compliance certificate - could lead to criminal prosecution. In a s...