Thinking · Standards

Implementing partner screening. Eligible is not the same as suitable.

Abhijith Magal · 18 September 2026 · 6 min read

The gap the law leaves open

Section 135 and the CSR Rules tell a company which organisations may receive its CSR money. A registered entity. A CSR-1 number. Three years of similar work. Pass those and you are eligible.

Then the law goes quiet. Nothing in it helps a company choose between forty eligible organisations, and nothing requires it to write down why it picked one.

Eligibility is binary, and the statute decides it. Suitability is comparative, and somebody has to judge it. Collapse the two into one question and you get programmes that fail on partner mismatch, and Board reports that cannot explain a selection two years after it was made.

How does IPSS screen an implementing partner?

It keeps eligibility and comparison apart, and runs them in that order.

Gate 0 tests statutory eligibility and integrity. Gate 1 tests whether this funder can engage this organisation at all, covering conflicts of interest, sanctions, litigation and similar exposure. A fail at Gate 0 or Gate 1 ends the assessment there, with the reason on record. An organisation that fails Gate 0 is not scored lower. It is not scored.

Organisations that clear the two gates are scored on thirteen dimensions, among them subject expertise, geographic presence, delivery capability, financial health, governance and safeguarding. Each score is read against a written level descriptor, not an impression of the organisation.

The dimension weights are set, and signed by the funder, before anyone knows which organisations are in the running. That one rule does more against favouritism than any amount of scoring. Nobody can tune a method towards an answer they have not seen yet.

Weighted totals fall into bands A to D. A very low score on certain dimensions caps the band whatever the total, because a high number resting on weak foundations is the exact result a screen exists to catch.

Every score carries a tag for how its evidence was obtained: counted from a document held, sourced from a named public register, or inferred. No organisation scores above 3 on inferred evidence alone.

And the funder pays the assessor. The screening record says so, in writing, on the page.

What it cannot do

This part of the standard deserves more attention than any other. IPSS lists eleven things it cannot do, and prints them in full in both editions. Read those first. A method that hides its limits is asking to be trusted. This one is asking to be checked.

A high score is a licence to have a conversation. It is never a recommendation to appoint.

That is the standard's governing rule, and it sits in the same plain type as everything else. No score substitutes for a screening call, a site visit and a document review.

What is open, and what is licensed

The architecture is public. The gates, the dimensions, the bands, the evidence rules, the impartiality controls and the stated limitations are all in the Public Edition. Anyone can examine how an IPSS decision is structured, and argue with it.

The level descriptors, the weighting logic and the assessment protocols are held under licence. This is not secrecy for its own sake. If the descriptors circulated freely, anyone could issue a document calling itself an IPSS screening without the training to apply them, and a funder would have no way to tell a real record from a lookalike.

Publishing the structure lets you test the method. Licensing the instrument protects the people who rely on what it produces.

The documents

All three are permanent records on Zenodo, with DOIs, so they can be cited and their publication dates cannot be quietly changed.

• Start here · White paper · Open accessEligible Is Not Suitable: Why implementing partner selection under Section 135 needs a screen, and how to start one. The shortest way in, written for CSR teams and state departments. CC BY-NC-ND 4.0. DOI 10.5281/zenodo.22823149
• The standard · Public Edition · Open accessIPSS v1.0, Public Edition. The full architecture, with its rationale, controls, limitations and links to the government registers it checks. 23 pages. CC BY-NC-ND 4.0. DOI 10.5281/zenodo.22814160
• The standard · Full Edition · LicensedIPSS v1.0, Full Edition. The complete normative text. 25 pages. The record is public; the files are released only under a signed licence. DOI 10.5281/zenodo.22815665

IPSS v1.0 was written on 1 August 2026 and frozen on 28 August 2026, when scores produced under it were first presented to a corporate funder on a live CSR engagement. Version 1.0 will not change. Corrections and improvements go into v1.1, with a published version history, so every past screening record stays readable against the exact method that produced it.

Two lines that do not move

No organisation's score is published without that organisation's knowledge and consent.

No money is taken from any screened organisation. No fee, commission, referral payment or gift, at any stage, in any form. The funder pays for a screening. Nobody else does.

These two rules are what separate a screening standard from a business selling access to a list. The rule on money is written into the standard as a provision no future version can change.

Common questions

What is implementing partner screening?

Implementing partner screening is the process a funder uses to choose which organisation will deliver a CSR programme, and to record why. Under Section 135 it comes after eligibility and before a contract. Eligibility says who may receive CSR funds. Screening says who fits this programme.

Is CSR-1 registration enough to select a partner?

No. CSR-1 registration shows an organisation may receive CSR funds. It says nothing about whether it can deliver your programme, in your geography, at your scale. IPSS treats CSR-1 as one of fourteen eligibility tests, then compares the organisations that pass.

Who can use IPSS?

Anyone can read, cite and discuss the Public Edition under CC BY-NC-ND 4.0. Producing a screening record under the IPSS name requires the Full Edition and a written licence. It is built for corporate CSR teams and public bodies that fund or coordinate CSR programmes. Organisations being screened can read exactly how they will be assessed.

Does an IPSS screening approve or accredit an organisation?

No. An IPSS screening produces a Screening Record and Recommendation for one funder, one programme and one point in time. It is not an accreditation, a rating, or a seal an organisation can display, and it carries no government endorsement.

What does IPSS cost?

Reading it costs nothing: the Public Edition and the white paper are open access. The Full Edition is licensed in writing, and institutional and commercial licences may carry a fee. Screening engagements are paid for by the funder. Screened organisations never pay, in any form.

How is IPSS kept up to date?

Version 1.0 is frozen and will not change. Improvements go into v1.1 with a published version history. The statutory positions it relies on are re-verified on a fixed schedule, with the next pass due by 1 November 2026, or sooner if CSR or FCRA rules change.

Abhijith Magal

Founder of Syntropy Earth, a Bengaluru-based advisory practice working at the intersection of climate, health and access, specialising in social impact programmes. Nine years in global pharma before that. Syntropy Earth designs a CSR programme first and screens implementing partners against that design, never the other way round. ORCID 0009-0005-4026-5462.

Last updated: 18 September 2026