Corporate Human Rights Due Diligence: Should India Adopt a Mandatory Framework?

Global supply chains, characterized by the growing engagement of multinational enterprises, has exacerbated concerns surrounding business-related human rights violations such as labour exploitation, environmental damage, unhealthy work environment, and other fundamental human rights abuses. This has catalysed the transformation of discretionary Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) practices into mandated Corporate Human Rights Due Diligence (CHRDD) framework where businesses are obliged to conduct assessment of human rights risks, preventing and mitigating adverse human rights impacts, and providing remedy. This paper interrogates whether India ought to implement a mandatory CHRDD framework and how to achieve it, through analysis of conceptual framework of human rights due diligence, evolution of international law on corporate human rights and the regulatory regimes introduced in France, Germany and the EU. Subsequently, the paper will scrutinise India’s legislative landscape including the Companies Act 2013, Business Responsibility and Sustainability Reporting (BRSR) regime of SEBI, existing labour and environmental legislation, constitutional provisions and judicial trends to gauge the adequacy and effectiveness of the legal system in curbing corporate human rights risks.