SME Times News Bureau | 29 Jan, 2018
In a bid to put a uniform
Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) spending in place, the Odisha
government has held a meeting with top corporates in the state to
discuss institutionalisation of CSR activities, an official said on
Saturday.
Chairing the meet, Industries Department
Principal Secretary Sanjeev Chopra talked of widespread disparity in
CSR spending across districts.
Ten Odisha districts had
received about 93 per cent of the CSR spending during 2014-17, the
meeting was told.
The state government has constituted a
CSR Council headed by the Chief Secretary to institutionalise CSR to
reduce disparity in CSR spending and assist corporates to align their
CSR activities with the state's developmental priorities.
The
CSR Council, during its first meeting in December, recommended more
than 800 projects provided by districts and welfare departments for
the corporates to consider undertaking as part of their CSR
activities.
The meeting was attended by Social Security
and Empowerment of Persons with Disabilities (SSEPD) Secretary Niten
Chandra and SSEPD Director Mansi Nimbhal.
Chandra urged
the corporates to take the initiative to extend equal job
opportunities to people with disabilities.
It was
mentioned that the Industrial Policy Resolution 2015 provides the
corporates with 100 per cent reimbursement on account of
contributions towards Employees State Insuramce and Employees
Provident Fund schemes for five years in MSMEs and priority sectors
for employing skilled and semi-skilled persons with
disabilities.
The state has developed first-of-its-kind
interactive portal GOCARE (csr.odisha.gov.in) which acts as a
one-stop shop for all CSR-related activities in Odisha.
The
portal contains district- and block-level Human Development Indices
which assist corporates to take better decisions during project
selection.