On May 11, Ramesh (name changed) a senior software engineer at a product engineering company at Technopark in Thiruvananthapuram, received a communication from the human resources department asking him to resign within two days, or else risk being terminated.
A day later, the office sent someone to his home to collect his laptop. With 12 years of experience in the field, such an unceremonious lay-off came as a rude shock for him.
“It all happened over the phone. Despite my requests to send me mails regarding this, they refused, for they knew what they were doing is not right. The reason given was low performance, but usually they put such people in a performance improvement programme. I have rents and EMIs to pay, a family dependent on this salary. My daughter is about to join first standard. I requested them to give me some time to mentally prepare or put me into some other project, but they refused,” says Ramesh.
No compensation
Following the COVID-19 pandemic, IT companies in Kerala, including in Technopark and Infopark in Kochi, have started laying off employees, without even the necessary compensation.
Although “performance issues” are being cited in all cases, those who have got the pink slips say that this is just a reason being made up to cut down numbers and save on employee cost.
On May 8, a 25-year old IT employee working at Infopark committed suicide, allegedly after she was informed that she would be laid off.
Early this month, Sandhya, a digital marketing professional at a Technopark firm, was told to put in her papers soon. The daughter of a security guard, her family is dependent on her salary.
Flimsy reasons
“I have seven years of experience and had joined this company last year. Although my probation period is already over, they are claiming that I am being laid off because my performance was low during probation. But, in the initial communication, they had said that they are doing it because the business is down. When I tried to mail them on May 2, I found that my account was removed. I still haven't submitted my resignation,” she says.
Another IT employee, Ramkumar, who has 10 years of experience, had to go through a humiliating ‘interview’ process, after which he was told that he was not technically fit and hence should quit.
“I don't understand the purpose of interview for a company, for which I have been working for years. I have got only positive feedback all this while. When I refused to resign, the HR manager even told me that I would have to depend on him for the experience letter and that he can even ensure that I won't get a job anywhere,” he says.
Plea to Labour dept.
Prathidhwani, a welfare organisation of IT employees, which has taken up the cause of the laid-off employees, has appealed to the IT companies to work together to overcome this crisis without looking at lay offs as the only solution.
“The Prime Minister and Chief Minister of Kerala have repeatedly appealed to companies to refrain from terminating employees during this crisis. We have been receiving a lot of complaints from laid-off employees. We have sent these to the Labour Department,” says Rajeev Krishnan of Prathidhwani.
