Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) funding in India still needs to be properly utilized with the government denying using this funds for its projects. Corporate can now count contributions towards designated technology incubators and contributions to public funded universities, Indian Institutes of Technologies, national laboratories and autonomous bodies engaged in research as part of their CSR expenditure.

Public sector firms spent Rs 2,553.36 crore towards corporate social responsibility expenditure in 2017-18, down 22.5 per cent from Rs 3,296 crore in the previous fiscal, Union minister of state for finance and corporate affairs Anurag Singh Thakur said. The FY17 number itself was 21.8 per cent less than state-run companies’ CSR spend in the previous year.

CSR expenditure by private sector companies increased 7.42 per cent during the same time period, from Rs 10,302.50 crore in 2015-16 to Rs 11,067 crore in 2017-18. The minister has also clarified that there was currently no provision requiring companies to mandatorily geo-tag their CSR projects. The board of directors of a company was empowered to decide on CSR expenditure to be undertaken and to monitor CSR activities.