Social Audit

  Many social schemes or CSR projects have seen the days of meeting the fate with corruption. The corruption in Indian society is from top to bottom. In such alarming situation the dream of reaching sustainability is far away. To eradicate this disease and ill practices, new class of “auditors” have appeared in India recently. They are called the “Social Auditors” from the Institute of Social Auditors of India (ISAI). Now, the ISAI is working under the Institute of Chartered Accountants of India at Mumbai. These auditors bring toughest standards in auditing using important skill of “Professional Scepticism”.      Now the “Sustainability Reporting Standards Board” of the ISAI, constituted under The Institute of Chartered Accountants of India is functioning under the ICAI, till ISAI can sustain and stand on its own. The toughest standards, so far 16 in numbers have been published.  The SEBI listed companies, the Social Stock Exchange listed companies are all within the ambit and control

Many CSR Professionals, Company Secretaries misunderstood the term " Social Impact Assessment" in the Company Act. This has arisen serious compliance error. This  article gives a clear perception on that:  1.The Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) of the United Nations in many of its regulatory schemes internally such as introduction of the Business Responsibility and Sustainability Reporting (BRSR) by SEBI in 2021 and the sustainability reporting format is based on the nine principles of National Guidelines for Responsible Business Conduct (NGRBC) introduced by SEBI. The disclosures intertwined  the BRSR report, which is published alongside the  annual report as an integral part. This is a standardized alignment practice of  non-financial disclosures of " Social Impact Assessment" carried on various CSR Projects conducted by a company to truly represent the  business operations in a transparent form. 2. The SEBI Law outlines the applicability of the BRSR  disclosu