Corporate social responsibility in community development and sustainability: Rourkela Steel Plant, a unit of SAIL, India Abstract An attempt is made in this article to explore and build knowledge on the corporate social responsibility (CSR) performances for community development and sustainability in the context of Rourkela Steel Plant of Steel Authority of India in Odisha, particularly in the wake of Companies Act, section 135, 2013. The paper looks at the conduct of CSR transitional strategy if any for delivering a range of activities while the amount of money spent on CSR is a common indicator of performance. The case is based on content analysis and narrative inquiry. In-depth, open-ended personal interview and focus group discussion were conducted with project participants, women leaders, youth, community stakeholders, NGO partners and officials. Hard data and field information on the impact of CSR initiatives were organised to validate the proposition. Findings indicate that brand building and creating far-reaching positive business impact of RSP-SAIL as a responsible corporate citizen were important outcomes. This paper sets up an analytical framework that defines transitional strategies at different levels of communities in terms of production, organisations, governance, institutions and culture of relationships, noting how best to guide corporate towards sustainable community development through its CSR policy.