Analyse the concerns regarding Public procurement and steps taken by the Government to improve the system of procurement.

Public procurement is the purchase by governments and state-owned enterprises of goods, services and works. There are many inequities and illegalities in public procurement. All of them must be tackled to improve the system.
�Concerns:

• There are many Charges of corruption over the stakeholders involved
• There are many regulations, guidelines and rules
• State public procurement is regulated by a State Act only in five States: Tamil Nadu, Karnataka, Rajasthan, Andhra Pradesh and Assam
• The grievance redress mechanisms provided are not effective
• The procuring officer not given all the powers related to the work. There is always an interaction of the Government
• There are many tenders which are unconstitutional and illegal so a number of cases have been take up in courts

Steps taken:�

• Establishment of GeM: It is an online procurement platform. MSMEs, DPIIT recognized startups and other private companies can register on GeM as sellers and sell their products and services directly to government entities
• Public Procurement Policy for Micro and Small Enterprises (MSME) order 2012: It mandated Every Central Ministry/Department/PSU shall set an annual goal for procurement from the MSE sector at the beginning of the year
• Government has issued Public Procurement (Preference to Make in India), Order 2017: The purchase preference shall be given to local suppliers in all procurements. The minimum local content shall ordinarily be 50%. The margin of purchase preference shall be 20%

Public procurement is a one of the pillars of services delivery for governments. There is need to well design the procurement system.