With the ongoing corporate week, ministry of corporate affairs is on a drive to approach companies for a public-private partnership in order to promote corporate social responsibilty. MCA would approach companies to undergo a public-private partnership wherein the ministry would propose to train and employ people with the companies and, in turn, provide fiscal relief and credit points on lines of carbon credits.
An ministry of corporate affairs official told FE, ?The ministry seeks more and more people to be trained and employed in the corporate sector. They will approach various companies during the corporate week for promoting corporate social responsibility and would, in turn, offer fiscal relief or credit points for taking up this initiative.?
Corporate affairs minister Salman Khurshid said, ?We are working on the concept of CSR where we would award special credit points to companies that undertake CSR activities. Infact, we foresee that we may have a CSR credit exchange one day. We will be in a public-private partnership with the corporates in which we will spend money on the training programmes and get people employed in the corporate sector. This way we can find a solution to the problem of unemployment and also address the lack of skilled workforce in India.?
Khurshid added, ?We need to go beyond affirmative action and CSR initiatives be given a fillip through fiscal relief. These issues need to be debated for their possible incorporation in the new Bill.?
According to sources, the ministry would discuss issues such as the annual spend on corporate social responsibility with the parliamentary standing committee, which is scrutinising the provisions of the new Companies Bill.
However, the industry body Ficci has suggested that the government should encourage companies to invest in CSR initiatives by giving tax incentives instead of making it binding. According to Ficci, MCA should not make CSR activities mandatory for the industry and should encourage them to adopt it voluntarily. Ficci is of the view that such a compulsion of CSR imposed on companies is likely to turn counter productive as companies may resort to camouflaging activities to meet such regulations.