Paper short abstract:

Corporate Social Responsibility in India is seeing a number of initiatives on water in collaborative partnerships. The paper seeks to understand these endeavors in a comparative framework (national & international) reflecting on alternate social implications with the aim to inform policy decisions.

Paper long abstract:

Corporates in India have joined hands with the developmental goals in the country, under its CSR (Corporate Social Responsibility) requirements. A number of initiatives on water and sanitation are finding their genesis in collaborative partnerships between the Government, Non-Government Organisation and the Corporates. However, it is feared that corporates are essentially proficient in the delegating economic value to most purposes, and might not be able to understand the value-system of the community they operate in, thus relegating development rather than propagating it (Blowfield 2005). The corporate intervention might actually lead to commodification of a resource that belongs to the people by right. In addition to this, there is often a stark political and economic power distinction in favor of the corporate, and socially responsible activities can obscure deeper contradictions and power relations which unevenly benefit corporations, while anaesthetizing citizens who might otherwise demand change (Kuhn and Deetz, 2008). Corporate Social Responsibility in India has seen a number of initiatives on water in collaborative partnerships.The paper seeks to understand these programmes in a comparative framework at both the national and international level. The attempt is to reflect on policy by drawing attention to the possible alternate social implications that these programmes might have.