‘Post the mandatory CSR obligations of Companies Act the family firms are more compliant when compared to non-family firms’, reveals an ISB study

Hyderabad: A study, titled ‘Family Businesses: Heeding the call of corporate conscience 2015-2017’, conducted by the Thomas Schmidheiny Centre for Family Enterprise at the Indian School of Business (ISB) was released by the Dean of ISB Professor Rajendra Srivastava, here today. The study talked about the patterns in CSR spending by the family businesses, in the context of the mandatory CSR regulations of the Companies Act.

A panel discussion on the subject was also organized with some of the eminent speakers including – Vijay Mahajan (Secretary & CEO, Rajiv Gandhi Foundation), Prof V Raghunathan (Director, Schulich School of Business, India Campus, Hyderabad and Ex-CEO, GMR Varalakshmi Foundation) and Jitendra Kalra (CEO, Foundation for Economic Development), Prof Raveendra Chittoor, Professor of Strategy, University of Victoria, along with other ISB faculty and students.

Speaking at the release event, ISB Dean said, “The rising inequality and other social and ecological imbalances necessitated greater formalization and regulation of the social obligations of firms across the world and especially in India. However, the CSR policy in India remains a work-in-progress given that India was the first country to develop such a prescriptive law. Questions arise in terms of their effectiveness, efficiency, impact and sustainability which are lacking in the data. Therefore, a multitude of unresolved issues and doubts about the implementation of the law come to the fore. The re-constitution of the high-level committee on CSR in November 2018 is a step in the right direction and points towards the intent of the Government to make the law more effective”.

See attached an Annexure for a brief note and the key findings of the white paper report. Also attached is the CSR Whitepaper Report.

Photo <L-R> Prof. Hariom Manchiraju, Associate Professor, ISB; Dr Nupur Pavan Bang, Associate Director, Thomas Schmidheiny Centre for Family Enterprise, ISB; Mr Jitendra Kalra, CEO, Foundation for Economic Development; Professor Rajendra Srivastava, Dean, ISB; Professor Kavil Ramachandran, Head, Thomas Schmidheiny Centre for Family Enterprise, ISB; Prof Raveendra Chittoor, Professor of Strategy, University of Victoria; Prof V Raghunathan, Director, Schulich School of Business, India Campus, Hyderabad and Ex-CEO, GMR Varalakshmi Foundation.