Jan Vishwas Amendment of Provisions Bill 2025

Jan Vishwas Amendment of Provisions Bill 2025

Why in News? 

The Union Government has withdrawn the Jan Vishwas (Amendment of Provisions) Bill, 2025 from the Lok Sabha to incorporate recommendations of a Select Committee and improve its provisions. 

What is the Jan Vishwas (Amendment of Provisions) Bill, 2025?

• About: The Jan Vishwas (Amendment of Provisions) Bill, 2025 is a legislative reform measure introduced by the Government of India to decriminalise minor offences and rationalise regulatory frameworks across multiple laws. 

• It seeks to amend around 16–17 Central Acts and covers nearly 355 provisions, aiming to replace criminal liability for technical defaults with civil mechanisms.

• The Bill is also known as “Jan Vishwas 2.0”. It was introduced in the Lok Sabha in August 2025 as part of broader governance reforms.

• Background: The Bill builds upon the Jan Vishwas Act, 2023, which had already decriminalised 183 provisions across 42 Central laws. 

• Over time, the government identified that colonial-era and outdated laws imposed excessive criminal penalties even for procedural lapses, discouraging entrepreneurship and increasing litigation. 

• Objectives: The primary objective is to promote “trust-based governance” by assuming good faith compliance from citizens and businesses. 

• It aims to enhance Ease of Doing Business and Ease of Living, reduce judicial burden, and create a business-friendly environment by simplifying laws and compliance systems. 

Highlights of Proposed Legal Reforms in Jan Vishwas Bill 2025

• Decriminalisation of Minor Offences: A total of 288 provisions are targeted for decriminalisation. This shift involves replacing imprisonment clauses for technical or procedural defaults with monetary penalties or simple warnings to foster a trust-based environment.
• Ease of Living Focus: The Bill includes 67 amendments specifically aimed at improving the Ease of Living for citizens. These reforms simplify daily legal interactions, reducing the fear of criminal prosecution for trivial administrative errors. 
• First-Time Offender Warnings: For 76 specific offences under 10 different Acts, the Bill provides that first-time violations will attract only an advisory or warning instead of immediate punishment. This allows individuals and entities a chance to correct mistakes. 
• Automatic Penalty Revision: To ensure fines remain effective deterrents, the Bill mandates an automatic 10% increase in minimum fines and penalties every three years. This mechanism applies unless the specific Act already contains its own revision method. 
• Administrative Adjudication Mechanism: The reform empowers designated adjudicating officers to handle inquiries and impose penalties through administrative processes. This is designed to significantly reduce judicial burden by keeping minor regulatory disputes out of the court system. 
• Graduated Penalty Framework: The Bill introduces proportionate and graduated penalties based on the severity and frequency of violations. Repeat offenders face higher financial consequences, while first-time procedural lapses are handled with leniency. 
• Improvement Notices: Under the Legal Metrology Act, 2009, the Bill introduces improvement notices for first-time offences like using non-standard weights. These notices require rectifying non-compliance within a set timeframe before fines are levied. 
• Motor Vehicles Act Relaxations: The Bill proposes amendments to the Motor Vehicles Act, 1988, including extending the reporting period for vehicle destruction from 14 to 30 days and allowing a 30-day grace period for expired driving licences.
• Electricity Act Penalty Reform: In the Electricity Act, 2003, the Bill removes the three-month imprisonment for non-compliance with orders. Instead, it imposes a strictly financial penalty ranging from ₹10,000 to ₹10 lakh. 
• NDMC Property Tax Restructuring: For the New Delhi Municipal Council Act, 1994, property tax is restructured into building tax and vacant land tax. It establishes a Municipal Valuation Committee to recommend base values for assessments.
• Appellate Authority System: To ensure fairness, the Bill establishes appellate mechanisms for all administrative penalty orders. In the NDMC Act, an officer one rank above the adjudicating officer serves as the Appellate Authority.
• Property Tax and Advertisement Tax: Offences like deliberate non-payment of property tax or furnishing false details will carry imprisonment ranging from one month to seven years along with a minimum fine of 50% of the tax evaded. The Bill also removes the provision for advertisement tax within the NDMC area.

Reasons for Withdrawal

The main reason for withdrawal was the examination of the Bill by the Select Committee, chaired by Tejasvi Surya, which recommended several modifications and improvements:

• The Select Committee recommended decriminalising 689 provisions across 78 laws, leading to removal of over 1,000 criminal offences. This significantly widened the Bill’s original scope (355 provisions in 17 Acts), requiring comprehensive redrafting.
• The Committee’s findings highlighted the need for major structural and legal modifications, including better alignment of penalty frameworks and adjudication mechanisms. The government withdrew the Bill to incorporate these wide-ranging legal corrections.
• The Committee emphasised that while minor procedural offences should be decriminalised, serious offences affecting public safety and trust must retain criminal penalties. This required a careful recalibration, prompting withdrawal to avoid weak enforcement.
• The Committee proposed graded penalties—such as warnings for first-time offences and fines for repeat violations—and clearer adjudication systems. Implementing such new compliance frameworks required further legislative detailing, necessitating withdrawal.
• Suggestions like creating a Centralised Regulatory Management System and improving digital compliance mechanisms required policy-level integration beyond the Bill’s original design, prompting reconsideration.