(This story originally appeared in on May 23, 2015)

A prominent businessman who flew into Delhi once every week is rarely seen in the corridors of power. Till last year, liaison or corporate affairs executives from myriad business houses walked into North Block or Shastri Bhavan (houses resource-based ministries) every morning as if they were entering their offices. They're no longer seen around government buildings.Even public sector executives, who walked into offices of joint secretaries or secretaries, have been advised to visit ministries only if called for meetings."The parade of industrialists outside South Block and North Block is over. The corridors are empty, the silence cheery," finance minister Arun Jaitley summed it up in his Facebook post earlier this week.For businessmen and public sector executives who thrived on visits and favours to ministers and bureaucrats, this may not be the best time to do business. The fear of someone keeping vigil on ministers and officers (the government denies this) and the new rules are changing the way business was done for the past several years.A series of decisions — from auctioning coal blocks to following a similar strategy for mining rights and coal linkages — are expected to do away with the need for Corporate India representatives to visit Delhi the way they used to till a few years ago, says a top government source.He says these policies are in line with the slogan PM Narendra Modi coined: "Minimum government, maximum governance". When he first spoke of it most took it as a signal of his wanting the size of government to be slashed, fewer ministries focusing on core areas. His initial selection of his council of ministers indicated that. But that was till he expanded his ministry.Now, sources say, Modi's focus is on easing procedures, the way he's done away with the need for photocopies being attested by officers or allowing online submission of life certificates by pensioners. There's talk of doing away with police verification for passports."The idea is to move to a system of self-certification and at the same time having a deterrent for wrong-doers," explained a government official.The insistence on shorter forms and doing away with unnecessary legislation has made ministries and government departments revisit practices and junk the need to seek irrelevant information. In the process, some have even discovered idle funds that can be put to productive use.Closer monitoring by PMO has meant ministries are on their toes and don't sit over proposals. So, instructions have been issued, clearly stipulating how responses to cabinet notes must be sent within a set number of days and even the format that the reports are sent in to the PMO.