Formulating New Corporate Environmental Policy for India - Through A Comparative Study of the European Union

Abstract

70 percent of greenhouse gas emissions is made by the industries. This study investigates how this problem can be solved by those companies itself. Section 135 of the act clearly States out the various functions of CSR and it does not mention about Corporate Environmental Responsibility and. Moreover, in the whole act which consists almost 470 sections the term ‘environment’ is only mentioned two times, this itself explains the environmental concerns of the law makers while drafting the act and companies are the main source of pollution in the world therefore lack statutory backing is the primary deficiency of the CER. The second issue with CER is that, in 2018 office memorandum by the Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change states out different guidelines to CER, even though the primary object of this OM was to address CER, but it does not help to implement the true intention of CER. Primarily, it is not focusing or referring the environment but social need as general for example it states about local farming developments, skill development, roads, electrification etc. The guideline is very vague in stating how a company should act environmentally responsible. The recent OM of September 2020 actually removes the idea of CER by merging it with Environment Management Plan. Currently there is no legislative support for CER in India. Therefore, this paper peaked into the legislative framework of the European union to know how they are dealing with CER. EU also does not emphasis the idea of CER, but various provisions related to make corporates environmentally responsible can be adopted from the EU. This paper has highlighted those provisions and more importantly the need of legislative backing to the CER in India to increase the overall standard of Indian environment and to prevent disasters like Bhopal gas tragedy.