CSR or is it C$R ???

{According to a recent poll 44% of the respondent in UK believe it is very important that a company shows a high degree of social responsibility when they buy a company’s product.  86% of consumers have a more positive image of a company that is seen to be doing something to make the world a better place.  Corporate Social Responsibility is now an integral part of building and maintaining a market share in a competitive market}.

But let us take a holistic view of this term in vogue. Let us not confine the term corporate to individual enterprise or for that matter just a petty firm. It is much more then what meets the eye. In this age of globalization, world has become a village. Where countries are corporate which have their interest in other countries for markets or as a source for their wants. World economy is highly integrated in this era. Where in a fall on the Wall Street have its repercussions on the Dalal Street. We can no more work in isolation as was the Indian norm of the past i.e. pre-liberalization era .When united states presidential candidate Barack Obama uses the word ‘Bangalore’ in his speech twice it send jitters down the Indian outsourcing fraternity.

Take a small case of ISRAEL for example. Israel occupies 98% of the west bank that officially belongs to the Palestinians and they also are de-facto rulers of the Gaza strip which is now commonly known as in media and political circles as the largest open air prison in the world. The operation cast lead of January 2009 was unanimously regarded as crime against humanity by the world community. This tarnished the image of this tiny nation which boasts of unconditional support from the only remaining superpower of our time i.e. the United States.

Now what does this entity do to re-build its image and credibility to be again counted amongst the civilized nations. Well it is rightly said that one man’s suffering is the other man’s gain. The dawn of 2010 saw the most impoverished country in the western hemisphere devastated by a major earthquake .The country in consideration is HAITI. Now how does this all relate to CSR? This question begs an answer.

The Jewish nation saw an opportunity in this despair. A field hospital was immediately set up by the country through a NGO called ZAKA. Now a country which is a stone throw away from the United States gets a field hospital from a country which is as we commonly say in our bollywood movies as ‘Saat Samandar Paar’,before the United States can. In a first couple of days a child is also born which is named after the state of ‘ISRAEL’. What is this entity trying to do is a question to ponder and is a subject of innumerable debates. This entity has got a legal and moral obligation towards the Palestinian people but to subdue the voices of the legitimate people of the land and divert the world’s attention from the mind numbing horrors of GAZA it is taking up an assignment which is across several continents so that it can be counted again in the list of so called ‘socially responsible states’.

A twister but its true ……

Raping the natural resources and indigenous people off their livelihood for their sinister interest be it Australian aborigines or American Red Indians. Then whitewashing their sins by this malicious tool provided to them by these ‘new order’ Economist/Anthropologist/Thinkers. Whether this weighs down on any thinking adult’s mind is a subject matter of another debate.