BRSR Core Explained: The Nine Attributes, Their KPIs and How It Differs from the Full BRSR

"BRSR Core" appears in Board papers, assurance statements and SEBI circulars as though it were self-explanatory, and it isn't. It's not a shorter BRSR. It's a specific list of numbers, grouped under nine headings SEBI calls attributes, each with a prescribed way of measuring it and a note telling the assurance provider what evidence to look for. This is what's on that list, where each number comes from inside a company, and how the Core relates to the full report it sits inside.

We've written separately about who must file the BRSR and about the assurance requirement and how to prepare for it. This piece is about the content.

Two documents, one filing

The full BRSR came first. From FY 2022-23, under the proviso to Regulation 34(2)(f) of the LODR Regulations, the top 1,000 listed entities by market capitalisation file a Business Responsibility and Sustainability Report as part of the annual report, in the format at Annexure 16 of the LODR master circular. It has three sections. Section A is general disclosures about the company: listing, activities, employees, holding structure, CSR, complaints. Section B is management and process: policies, governance, review. Section C is performance against the nine principles of the National Guidelines on Responsible Business Conduct, from "conduct and govern with integrity" (Principle 1) to "engage with consumers responsibly" (Principle 9). Under each principle there are essential indicators, which are mandatory, and leadership indicators, which are voluntary. The whole thing runs to well over a hundred questions, a lot of them narrative.

BRSR Core came a year later. SEBI's circular of 12 July 2023 defined it, in words the master circular still carries at paragraph 2.1, as "a sub-set of the BRSR, consisting of a set of Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) / metrics under 9 ESG attributes". The reason for carving it out was verification. Narrative can't be assured; numbers with a defined method can. So SEBI picked the quantitative disclosures it considered most decision-useful, wrote a measurement method for each, and made that subset the object of the assessment-or-assurance requirement. The format is Annexure 17A, and the last column of that annexure cross-references every Core KPI back to the principle and question in the full BRSR it draws on.

The relationship, then: the full BRSR is the report; the Core is the part of it that a third party checks. Companies in the top 1,000 report both, in one filing. The numbers in the Core must agree with the numbers in Section C, because they are the same numbers.

Key number: 9 — attributes in BRSR Core, against 9 principles in the full BRSR. They are not the same nine, and the Core's cross-reference column is the only map between them.

The nine attributes and what they measure

Annexure 17A gives each parameter a unit, a "Data & Assessment or Assurance Approach" and a cross-reference. Paragraph 2.2 of the master circular calls the approach "only a base methodology" and says "any changes or industry specific adjustments / estimations shall be disclosed". Here is the list, with the part of the company that usually owns the number.

1. Greenhouse gas footprint

Scope 1 and Scope 2 emissions in tonnes of CO2e, with a breakdown into the seven GHG Protocol gases "if available". The annexure spells out the arithmetic for Scope 1: fuel consumed times emission factor, minus carbon captured, plus process emissions, plus fugitive emissions. Scope 2 is purchased energy times an emission factor, either IPCC or the supplier's audited figure. Then two intensity ratios: emissions per rupee of revenue adjusted for PPP, and emissions per unit of output, where the output metric is sector-specific (vehicles produced, tonnes of material, terabytes, room-nights). Scope 3 is not in the Core. Cross-reference: Principle 6, question 7. Owner: EHS or plant engineering for the activity data, finance for the denominators.

2. Water footprint

Total water consumption in kilolitres or million litres, defined as water "no longer available for use by the ecosystem or local community", which the annexure allows to be calculated as metered input minus metered output where direct measurement isn't possible. Then the same two intensity ratios, and water discharge by destination and level of treatment (untreated, primary, secondary, tertiary). Cross-reference: Principle 6, questions 3 and 4. Owner: plant utilities.

3. Energy footprint

Total energy consumed in joules or multiples, defined as non-renewable fuel plus renewable fuel plus purchased electricity, heat, cooling and steam plus self-generated energy, counted once. Renewable share as a percentage. Two intensity ratios. Cross-reference: Principle 6, question 1. Owner: plant utilities and procurement, because renewable share depends on power purchase agreements and certificates.

4. Embracing circularity: waste

The longest attribute. Waste generated by category, each defined by the relevant Indian rules: plastic (Plastic Waste Management Rules 2016), e-waste, bio-medical, construction and demolition, battery, radioactive, other hazardous (per CPCB), other non-hazardous by composition. Total waste, two intensity ratios, waste recovered by recycling or reuse per category, and waste disposed by method (incineration, landfill, other). A note added in March 2025 requires disclosure where "certificates from vendors have been relied upon for assessment or assurance of KPIs on waste management". Cross-reference: Principle 6, question 9. Owner: EHS, with the vendor certificate file.

5. Enhancing employee well-being and safety

Spending on well-being of employees and workers as a percentage of total revenue, with the annexure listing what counts: health, accident and maternity insurance, paternity benefits, day care, health and safety measures "including access to mental health". Then safety incidents for employees and workers including contract workforce: permanent disabilities, lost time injury frequency rate per million person-hours (the formula is printed), and fatalities, checked against claims reported to the Factory Inspector. Cross-reference: Principle 3, questions 1(c) and 11. Owner: HR for the spend, EHS for the incidents.

6. Enabling gender diversity in business

Gross wages paid to women as a percentage of total wages paid, verified against the employee master. Complaints under the Prevention of Sexual Harassment Act: total reported, as a percentage of female employees and workers, and the number upheld. Cross-reference: Principle 5, questions 3(b) and 7. Owner: payroll and the internal committee.

This is the first of the three attributes SEBI designed for India rather than borrowed. The wage-share measure is harder to flatter than a headcount ratio, which is the point.

7. Enabling inclusive development

Input material sourced directly from MSMEs and small producers, and from within India, each as a percentage of total purchases by value, with "input material" defined to include raw material, spares, services and capex items. Job creation in smaller towns: wages paid to people employed in rural, semi-urban and urban locations (RBI classification) as a percentage of total wage cost. Cross-reference: Principle 8, questions 4 and 5. Owner: procurement for the first, HR and payroll for the second, and both need the location master to be clean.

8. Fairness in engaging with customers and suppliers

Two very different numbers. Instances involving loss or breach of customer data as a percentage of total data breaches or cyber-security events (Principle 9, question 7). And number of days of accounts payable, computed as accounts payable times 365 over cost of goods and services procured, taken from the financial statements (Principle 1, question 8). Owner: the information security function and the finance controller, who rarely sit in the same BRSR meeting.

9. Openness of business

Concentration of purchases and sales with trading houses, dealers and related parties: purchases from trading houses as a share of total purchases, number of trading houses, share from the top ten; sales to dealers and distributors as a share of total sales, number of dealers, share to the top ten; and the share of related-party transactions in purchases, sales, loans and advances, and investments, checked against the audited RPT disclosures. Cross-reference: Principle 1, question 9. Owner: finance and the company secretary.

Openness of business is the attribute companies most often underestimate, because it looks like a governance question and behaves like a data one. The dealer and trading-house counts and the top-ten shares come from the sales and purchase ledgers, and the provider will trace them there.

In practice: the Core has three data owners that first-time filers forget to invite: the finance controller (days payable, revenue, PPP conversion, RPT shares), payroll (wages to women, wages by town classification) and information security (breach counts). Get all three into the kick-off.

The intensity ratios and the PPP question

Every environmental attribute in the Core carries the same pair of ratios, and the first of them is what makes BRSR Core different from every other national format. The denominator is total revenue from operations from the audited profit and loss statement, converted at a purchasing power parity rate for USD to INR rather than the market exchange rate. Paragraph 2.1 gives the reason: "for better global comparability". A rupee buys more in India than its market exchange rate suggests; an intensity computed on market-rate revenue would make Indian companies look more emissions-intensive per dollar of output than they are.

Three consequences for the preparer. The PPP rate used is a disclosure in its own right, and providers ask for its source (most use the IMF or World Bank implied PPP conversion factor for the year). Revenue from operations must tie to the audited number, which means the Core can't be finalised before the accounts are. And the second ratio, per unit of product or service, needs a defensible output metric that stays consistent year to year; a company that changes from "tonnes produced" to "units shipped" has to say so.

What the Core leaves out

Reading Annexure 17A is also useful for what isn't there. No Scope 3. No biodiversity. No training hours, attrition or engagement scores. No CSR spend. No human rights due diligence, grievance mechanisms or supplier assessments. No policy or governance narrative at all. All of those remain in the full BRSR as essential or leadership indicators, and several of them are exactly what an ESG rating agency weights most. The Core is deliberately narrow: a set of numbers a provider can trace to a meter, an invoice, a payroll file or a ledger.

That narrowness explains an odd feature of the FY 2025-26 season. Companies report "reasonable assurance on BRSR Core, limited assurance on the rest of the BRSR" as if the second half were required. It isn't; the assurance mandate is on the Core alone. Most large companies obtain limited assurance on the rest anyway, because the rating agencies read it and because the marginal cost once a provider is on site is small.

What changed, and when

Three circulars govern the Core, all consolidated into the January 2026 master circular. The July 2023 circular created it, set the assurance glide path and the provider independence rule, and introduced value chain disclosures. The December 2024 circular made the Industry Standards Forum's reporting standards binding from FY 2024-25; paragraph 2.5.3 of the master circular says listed entities "shall follow the above industry standards to ensure compliance with SEBI requirements on disclosure of BRSR Core". The March 2025 circular replaced "assurance" with "assessment or assurance" throughout, made value chain reporting voluntary, and added the vendor-certificate note under waste.

The attributes and KPIs themselves have not changed since July 2023. A company that built its data model for the first Core in FY 2023-24 is still collecting the same numbers; what has changed is who verifies them and how many companies must have them verified. The glide path reaches the top 1,000 in FY 2026-27, which we've covered here.

How the Core maps to GRI and the ISSB

Companies that already report under GRI will recognise most of the Core: Scope 1 and 2 (GRI 305-1 and 305-2), water consumption and discharge (GRI 303-4 and 303-5), energy (GRI 302-1), waste by category and disposal (GRI 306-3 to 306-5), LTIFR and fatalities (GRI 403-9). The master circular's paragraph 1.5 allows cross-referencing from the BRSR to disclosures made under GRI, SASB, TCFD or Integrated Reporting, and a good BRSR index does exactly that. The three India-specific attributes have no GRI equivalent and have to be built from scratch: wages to women, wages by town classification, and openness of business.

IFRS S1 and S2 are a different kind of document, focused on financially material risks and opportunities rather than a fixed metric set, and India has not adopted them. Where they overlap with the Core is Scope 1 and 2 under S2, which is why the GHG Protocol methodology the Core prescribes will serve a company well if ISSB-aligned reporting arrives.

Reading a BRSR Core in an annual report

For a reader rather than a preparer, three things are worth checking. The provider's statement should name the standard used (ISAE 3000 (Revised), ISAE 3410 for GHG, or the ISF assessment standard) and the boundary, and the boundary should match the one in Section A of the BRSR. The intensity ratios should disclose the PPP rate and the output metric, and the prior year should be restated if either changed. And the openness-of-business figures should reconcile to the related-party note in the financial statements, because that is where the provider will have traced them.

If those three hold, the Core is doing what SEBI designed it to do: turning the part of sustainability reporting that can be measured into numbers someone has actually checked.