We need an Indianised approach to CSR: Mukesh

Reliance Industries’ chairman Mukesh Ambani today asked Indian corporate houses to adopt a new business model measured on social and financial returns, while imbibing the country’s ethos and value systems. “Businesses will not only have to act as the trustees of their shareholders or owners, but also have to care for society by the virtue of the licence given to them by the latter itself. They should be measured on social returns, together with financial returns,” he said while delivering a lecture on corporate social responsibility (CSR) initiatives, organised by the Madhya Pradesh Foundation.

Ambani said it needed to be “an integral part of the DNA of a company, so much so that it has be to be an organic part of the business”.

He further said the business houses needed to adopt an Indianised approach to CSR, incorporating Indian ethos and value systems.

“We will have to move from the CSR model to one of continuous social business through enterprise and entrepreneurship...where societal needs and gaps are seen as duties as opposed to business opportunities,” he said, adding this kind of business model would integrate 400 million marginalised Indians into the mainstream social and economic fabric in the coming decades.

Planning Commission deputy chairman Montek Singh Ahluwalia suggested a new model of CSR initiatives wherein at least a one-year sabbatical is given to young entrants willing to work for a social cause or an NGO.