The President of India,Pranab Mukherjee addressed the inaugural session of the National Summit on CSR (Corporate Social Responsibility) on the theme ‘Boardroom and Beyond’ organized by the Confederation of Indian Industry (CII) today (April 29, 2015). The President also unveiled the logo of ‘Sammaan’, a platform for CSR created jointly by Bombay Stock Exchange (BSE), CII and Indian Institute of Corporate Affairs.
Speaking on the occasion, the President said inclusive growth calls for intensive collaborative efforts of the government and the corporate sector to provide the basics for improving the quality of life in our rural and urban areas. Corporate sector must provide renewed impetus to CSR initiatives towards cleanliness, health and education. The President said the CSR provision in the Companies Act, 2013 will help unlock a substantial amount - estimated to be in the range of Rs. 8,000 to 20,000 crore - for social sector engagement of Indian companies. A structured development strategy is now required to ensure that these funds are efficiently deployed in areas most beneficial to society. In a country as vast as India, scalability is critical to the success of programmes. Leading industry associations like CII must encourage pooling of funds by companies to create large high impact programmes. In this context, the Foundation set up by CII to reinforce CSR initiatives of various businesses is commendable.