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The purpose of this study is to examine the impact of corporate social responsibility (CSR) expenditure and business responsibility report (BRR) on a firm’s financial performance. Additionally, the study explores whether CSR expenditure and firm performance are related linearly or otherwise. The study also assesses the influence of mandating CSR expenditure on a firm’s performance.

The study is set in India and uses a nine-year data set from 165 companies listed on the Bombay Stock Exchange. Data compilation and analysis are done by using content analysis and panel data regressions.

The main findings of the study are that the effect of CSR expenditure on firm performance in India is non-linear and can be characterized as parabolic for investigated firms. While some performance indicators suggest a U-shaped relationship, others show an inverted U-type pattern, making a definitive conclusion elusive in either direction. BRR scores themselves have a positive impact on firm performance. Mandatory CSR expenditure affects the financial performance negatively, but the market performance improves in general.

The study provides new insights on the relationship between CSR expenditure, BRR scores and firm performance from India, which is not only a notable emerging market but also has other gripping characteristics. It has a prolific history of philanthropy, and yet, it is the first country in the world to mandate CSR expenditure in recent times. The equation between reported economic progress and general quality of life remains intriguing, and yet the number of studies on the effects of CSR expenditure on firm performance are no match to the volume of ongoing and completed works in more developed markets. This study attempts to trim the gap and provide some useful insights for managers, policymakers and stakeholders, apart from prompting further research.

Increasing focus on socially responsible investments (SRIs) and green projects in recent times, coupled with the arrival of COVID pandemic, are the main drivers of this study. The authors conduct a post-factum analysis of investor choice between sin and green investments before and through the COVID outbreak.

A passive investor is introduced who seeks maximum risk-adjusted return and/or investment variance. When presented an opportunity to add sin and/or green investments to her initial one-asset market-only investment position, she views and handles this issue as a portfolio problem (MPT). She estimates value-at-risk (VaR) and conditional-value-at-risk (CVaR) for portfolios to account for downside risk.

Green investments offer better overall risk-return optimization in spite of major inter-period differences in return-risk dynamics and substantial downside risk. Portfolios optimized for minimum variance perform just as well as the ones optimized for minimum downside risk. Return and risk have settled at higher levels since the onset of COVID, resulting in shifting the efficient frontier towards north-east in the return-risk space.

The study contributes to the literature in two ways: One, it examines investor choice between sin and green investments during a global health emergency and views this choice against the one made during normal times. Two, instead of using the principles of modern portfolio theory (MPT) explicitly for diversification, the study uses them to identify investor preference for one over the other investment type. This has not been widely done thus far.

This paper is an outcome of the study made for designing the multimedia‐based orientation programme of the Dyal Singh College Library (DSCL), New Delhi, India. The purpose of this paper is to enlighten the new students and to create insight into the operations of the DSCL.

Macromedia Flash software is used in designing and developing the multimedia‐based library orientation programme of the DSCL. In this study, the quality and usefulness of the information provided is evaluated through feedback. The structure of the programme is divided into 227 snapshots lasting for 20 min. A survey was conducted using structured feedback comprising of five questions.

Regarding the implementation of multimedia‐based library orientation programme and the responses received from the respondents regarding usefulness of information presented in the programme, except “library online public access catalogue & internet browsing”, all other features are found to be either excellent or very good. The quality features, such as, easy to understand (76.44 per cent), programme content (60.23 per cent), programme graphics, sound and special effects (46.76 per cent) are rated as excellent; and the length of the programme (72.28 per cent) and comprehensiveness (51.74 per cent) are rated as good. The overall evaluation of the programme is rated as very good (62.55 per cent).

This paper is not conceived to replace live college library tours, but rather to supplement them. In its present non‐linear form, the programme allows the user to start at the beginning and run through to the end. However, users cannot interact with the video but they can stop, forward and backward the programme.

Highly useful for new students who face the constraints of inconvenient timings and format; reduces the burden of the library staff of imparting physical library orientation and improves the library image in this age of information; and helps the user in overcoming the geographical and language barriers.

The paper provides the advantages of multimedia‐based library orientation in college libraries. The multimedia‐based library orientation programme has been developed as an effective means of conveyance and makes information handy and accessible on the college site as “virtual tour”. The entire programme can be viewed at and develops creativity among college librarians in designing such programmes.