St John's alumnus is first CEO of Punjab CSR Authority

The Punjab Govt. today announced the appointment of media veteran,

Dr Sandeep Goyal

as the

first CEO

of the recently constituted Punjab CSR Authority, which has been tasked with the responsibility of attracting CSR funds from industry both within Punjab, and from outside the state, and streamlining the CSR activities to coalesce into a set of common goals. The CEO will report to the Secretary, Industries & Commerce, Punjab. The state of Punjab ranks quite low on India Inc’s priority list for CSR. The state has received just Rs. 234.27 crore – a meager 0.55% of the total Rs. 42,467.23 crore of CSR spending by industry across all the different states and union territories of India – between the financial years 2015-16 and 2017-18, according to the Union Ministry of Corporate Affairs data, based on the filings made by the companies up to June 30, 2019.
Goyal is a local St. John’s school alumnus. He did his BA (Honours) in English Literature from

DAV College, Chandigarh

, graduating with a gold medal from

the Panjab University

. He went on to do his MBA, and then many years later his PhD, from

FMS-Delhi

. He is also an alumnus of Harvard Business School. Goyal was President of the iconic ad agency in the late 1990s. He was then Group CEO of a TV network before turning entrepreneur in 2003.
Dr. Goyal is currently Chairman of

the India Advisory Board of

Snap Inc. He is also the Chief Mentor of the Indian Institute of Human Brands (IIHB), a think-tank that specializes in celebrity studies.
“I am delighted to be selected by

the Punjab Government

to lead

the CSR Authority

. It is not an easy assignment. CSR funds are going to be under severe pressure because corporate profits are likely to be seriously impacted by the current pandemic and the lockdowns. Nevertheless, once the pall of gloom lifts somewhat, we will look to build durable and long-term partnerships with industry to support projects that benefit the state, and its subjects, across a broad spectrum of initiatives”, says Goyal.