NEW DELHI: As per a report, Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) fund deposit in PM Relief Fund has gone substantially down by 80% from FY 15-16 to FY 17-18. Maharashtra, Karnataka and Gujarat together received over 25% of India’s total CSR fund. The north-eastern states of Nagaland, Meghalaya, Mizoram and Tripura have received lowest CSR funding so far, according to the recent released recently.
Reliance Industries Ltd., HDFC Bank Ltd., Wipro Limited, Tata Steel, NTPC, Indian Oil Corporation & ONGC spent more than their prescribed CSR budgets in FY 2017-18, report revealed.
In FY 2017-18 Reliance Industries again became the top spender amongst the top 10 performers to spend more than its prescribed CSR budget.
Report says that CSR spends of 359 companies, 35 public sector companies 5233 projects implemented. The prescribed CSR Budget of these big 359 companies was 9543.51 cr. The Actual CSR Spend was 8875.93 cr. Actual CSR compliance to prescribed CSR is 93% and Effective CSR Compliance is 89% thus a difference of plus 2% from last financial year.
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These 359 companies account for almost 3/4th of the total CSR spend in India, making it a big sample size for any such study and analysis and were short-listed on the basis of INR 1 Cr. or above prescribed CSR in FY 2017-18, Listed on BSE or subsidiary of a BSE-listed company, availability of data by 31st Aug. 2018 and CSR disclosures as per the Companies Act, 2013. Only 27% companies, having unspent CSR fund in FY 16-17, have mentioned categorically about spending the fund in FY 2017-18.
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These 10 companies together spent Rs. 3,306 crore as part of their CSR fund, when their prescribed CSR spend was Rs. 3,160 crore. There is an increase in the prescribed CSR from 6% to 8% in the actual CSR spend from FY 16-17 and the number of projects have also increased by 25% from the previous year. This indicates a renewed sense of seriousness among companies as they strive to match the prescribed CSR requirements with the actual CSR spends.
Public sector enterprises account for over 1/4th of India’s total CSR spend which comes to Rs. 2419 cr. Oil, refinery and petrochemicals sector companies command almost 1/4th of the CSR fund of India which is 2092 cr while the lowest is Healthcare & Pharmaceuticals with a CSR compliance of just Rs. 294 cr.
CSR funding in education and skill development areas have increased by 50% from FY 15-16 to FY 17-18 which comes to Rs. 3121 cr. Over 1/3rd of the CSR spend is on education and skill development projects while over 1/4th of the CSR spend is on WASH and healthcare projects which is Rs. 2385 cr. The report highlighted that 3035 projects were executed by implementing agencies and 96 companies did not follow the same, and could not provide information like project location, implementing partners, and project specific budget and spends.
Section 135 of the Companies Act 2013, requires companies with net worth of Rs. 500 crore or more, or with annual turnover of Rs. 1,000 crore or more, or with a net profit of Rs. 5 crore or more, to mandatorily spend 2 percent of the average net profit of the preceding three years on CSR activities, establish a CSR committee and report CSR activities.
