Our CSR policy is guided by the philosophy of giving back to society: Jitender Aggarwal, CMD, AGGCON

Jitender Aggarwal

Corporate social responsibility (CSR) is the commitment of businesses to work ethically and contribute to the social and environmental well-being of stakeholders and communities. But as the world is also undergoing rapid and complex changes, CSR is also facing challenges due to different needs of societies due to increasing globalization, diversity of business environment, working in different cultural and socio-political set ups.

In spite of this, I believe in what Bill Ford thinks. He says, creating a strong business and building a better world are not conflicting goals and they are both essential ingredients for long-term success. Secondly, his belief that corporations could and should be a major force for resolving social and environmental concerns in the twenty-first century.

I have also grown up with this idea as my father, Shri B.M. Aggarwal, also known as ‘man of equipment rentals’, who had set up an infrastructure rental business 50 years ago, in a small town of Shekhawati region of Rajasthan, has always inculcated in me that with every business comes the responsibility, and we all should give back to society.

AGGCON’s corporate social responsibility (CSR) policy is therefore, strongly guided by this idea. Our CSR policy focusses strongly on ESG – Environmental, Social and Governance concerns and for this we work for the communities wherever we work at any place in India.

Under our Environmental Goals, we run a CSR project – “Tree of Friendship” under which we do plantation of trees at all project sites and nurture them as mark of solidarity with our clients and to sensitize people to plant trees for healing the earth and environment. We also gift plants to every visitor at our office and to people.  On this World Environment Day 2024, we got 2000 planted. Trees will play a significant role in fighting against climate change. The concept of LiFE (Lifestyle for environment) advocated by Prime Minister Narendra Modi is very important for accelerating resilient and inclusive growth for sustainable development. We always urge people to adopt trees in their LiFE.

Net zero by 2050 is the goal for everyone. It means we will have to reach a level where emissions will be balanced by absorbing an equivalent amount from the atmosphere.

In fact, an equipment rental company can contribute quite significantly to sustainability through their services. As the rental industry operates in a circular business model, therefore, it fulfils the circular economy principles – shared usage, repairability, resource use, reusability, recyclability, and, by doing so, minimizes the negative environmental impact of equipment. European Rental Association (ERA) has done extensive study on the circular business model in rental industry and had also commissioned the research on reducing carbon emissions.  Michel Petitjean, Secretary General, ERA commissioned this study to confirm and quantify the contribution of equipment rental industry in reduction of carbon emissions. The research concluded that the renting can lead to significant reductions in carbon emissions, in the range of 30% and sometimes over 50%.

To keep emissions in check and for efficient use, our policy is to buy new and latest technology equipments only and we do not deal in used equipments at all. We always keep our fleet young. Our operators are skilled and our maintenance division maintains equipments well.

Similarly, our social goals are also well defined and we have a well-defined policy of doing at least one community service project at every project site or near it within three months of starting work at a site to ensure giving back to society from where we earn. We undertake CSR activities at the project sites wherever we work all over India. We follow a procedure of identifying the need of communities around the project area and accordingly we move ahead. We have installed drinking water coolers in schools for children, sitting benches and water coolers at temples and various other things based on the need of people around the site in different locations and states. As our operators work in remote areas, we make sure to be with them and therefore we celebrate their birthdays and anniversaries at sites.

Women empowerment is an important focus area in AGGCON’s social goals. AGGCON runs a special programme for empowering Women – EWOT (Empowering Women of Tomorrow) and Beti Bachao Beti Padhao programme. We always celebrate the birth of a girl child in the family of team members and give a cheque Rs 10000 to the team member on the birth of a daughter. In addition to it, we also ensure free education to daughters of all our employees. We also contribute in the marriages of our team members including operators.

We have been vocal for creating more opportunities and conducive environment for women in India’s equipment rental industry. As industry needs qualified and skilled work force, it should therefore take it as an opportunity to include adequate number of women in the industry as operators, in technical positions and in managerial cadre, and also at senior positions. Understanding that women would play an important role in India’s equipment rental industry in future, we also run training sessions for women team members to prepare them for bigger roles in the rental industry.

AGGCON is a progressive rental company. I can say it is among the few companies who has adopted international standards and working with thorough professionalism and has modern set up. Therefore, we always work to achieve our governance goals. We regularly complete all our compliance on time and follow all laws of the land. We have well defined leadership, management teams and well-defined responsibilities. We focus on building good relationships with our stakeholders.

Lastly, we should promote oneness of the infrastructure ecosystem where all the stakeholders of rental industry work together for the larger ESG goals of the country.
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(The writer is the Chairman & Managing Director, AGGCON Equipments International Pvt Ltd)