Chapter 1:

INTRODUCTION
Corporate Social Responsibility is a self-regulating business model that makes the company to
be social responsible to its stakeholders, to itself and the public. CSR can be coined in various
terms such as corporate sustainability, sustainable business, corporate conscience, corporate
citizenship, conscious capitalism or responsible business. It basically defines how a firm
manages all its business processes so that it is able to produce a positive impact in the society.
It focuses on sustainability, core ethics and social impact as well. Most of the company’s focus
on 2 main important aspects. The first aspect being how good they are able to manage the
people and the processes taking within the firm. The second aspect is the social impact the firm
or the organization has and its nature as well as quality of it. Most stakeholders today are mainly
focused on the outside activities of the organization mainly. Such as if the quality of the
products produced is good or bad, if it has an effect on ecosystem or environment as such and
the local communities, how they treat their workforce etc.
Through various CSR programs, philanthropy and other volunteer efforts the companies can
benefit the society in many ways and also increase its own brand image. The CSR activities by
various firms also helps to create a stronger bond between the employees and the employers
and feel connected to the society around them.
Ownership structure deals with the internal organization of a business entity. It deals with the
rights and duties of the individuals who holds a legal or equitable interest in that firm. Now,
these structures are very important to determine the corporate governance as they help in
understanding the economic incentives for the managers as well as understand the economic
efficiency of the firm in the market. There are various types of ownership structures such as
sole proprietorship, partnership, corporation etc. which will be discussed in the report further.
It is often found that shareholders have an active ownership to gain a role on the firm’s
management and decision.
STATEMENT OF THE PROBLEM
The problem statement here is to examine and understand the effect of ownership structure on
the corporate social responsibility of the firm. Here, we are basically trying to study how
various firms of different industries such as Petroleum, Automotive, FMCG, Oil, Bank, Cement
etc. participate in CSR activities and the effects that they have on the society. These firms are
of various sizes and have different methods of governance. Yet, CSR is the most discussed
term in academic and business areas and how the various firms or organization participate in
various CSR activities also tells a lot about the firm. The shareholders contribute a lot toward
the CSR activities of the firm and also helps in increasing the brand image as well as the brand
value of the firm. We will try to analyze how much of CSR activities are disclosed by the firms
and how positively or negatively they impact the society. Also, we will try to understand if the
ownership structures are also the important factors in understanding if the organizations
participates in a particular CSR activity.