CSR: Where are the Companies Spending?

Corporate Social Responsibility became a popular concept in the 1990s , advocating a shift from shareholder primacy to a stakeholder-oriented approach, acknowledging that corporations withstand a duty to include larger societal and environmental concerns as a part of their business obligations. The Indian Government, from 2009-2013, issued a series of guidelines to encourage more businesses to take up CSR activities and publish sustainability reports as a voluntary measure towards assuming greater accountability “for the social and environmental issues plaguing the nation” . While schedule VII lists down various social causes that can be taken up to fulfill the mandatory requirement, it doesn’t give a direction as to how the allocation of funds needs to be done. This research thus aims at finding out how the chosen corporates have been allocating their CSR funds over 5 years (2015-2019), consequently suggesting some reforms in the provision that could help encourage more companies to fulfill their CSR obligations.