Lack of a Dedicated Focus on Dalit in Corporate Social Responsibility Projects: A Qualitative Exploration of Mandated CSR in India

The concepts of caste discrimination and corporate social responsibility are not novel. They have existed for decades in social, political and academic discourses, albeit as separate concepts. Notably, how CSR engages with Dalit issues in India has not been explored, especially in mandated CSR. This article explores why corporates do not cater devoutly to the needs of Dalits in CSR projects. The article adopts a qualitative approach to interviewing participants from corporates, NGOs and external consultants from research and academic organizations. The author adopted the thematic analysis method and arrived at four major themes about the lack of a dedicated focus on Dalits in CSR projects. These are corporate boards’ caste-blindness, the design of CSR projects, the adoption of the umbrella target category—‘poor’ and the changing character of NGOs. These findings suggest larger structural issues with the way CSR projects are planned, designed and implemented, excluding the scheduled castes (SC). The findings underline a glaring gap and the need for corporates to understand the issues faced by SCs, resulting in inequality, poverty and socioeconomic exclusion. There is a crucial need for corporates to direct, design and implement their CSR projects with a dedicated focus on empowering the Dalit population.