Retrenched employees say they were forced to resign; approach unions

Employees of domestic and international information technology companies in India are claiming they were not fired, instead were forced to resign by their employers to save severance package.

IT professionals are facing a tough time as the industry is handing over pink slips to employees in a bid to trim costs amidst a slowdown.

Employees are now alleging they were pressured to resign.

"I was given two days' time to resign and with no compensation. I have a child and a home loan to pay, I need a severance to keep me going until I find my next job at least. I did not join the company over one phone call, right? Why should I accept resignation over a call?” one the employees told ET.

The employee has now approached Bengaluru-based IT/ITes Employee Centre (ITEC), which is dubbed as welfare association for IT employees.

Likewise, many employees are approaching unions over forced resignations.

However, technology industry expert Siddharth Pai told ET that the companies were not being unfair to the employees.

"Companies would not have paid as much as the employees expected. But, contractually they would have met all the obligations. I don't think it is a fair allegation to make,” Pai, founding partner of 3one4 Capital, told ET.

"We get so many calls every day about companies forcing employees to resign. We got close to 200 phone calls in the last 3 weeks in our helpline number. Publicly companies are denying any retrenchment, but they are forcing people to resign on the other side,” an ITEC spokesperson told ET.

Also, employee unions such as Chennai-headquartered Forum for IT Employees (FITE) and IT-wing of National Democratic Labour Front (NDLF) say they are seeing more IT employees reaching out to them seeking legal counsel.

On the flip side, law on unionisation in the IT industry in Karnataka is somewhat ambiguous.

The Indian IT is no stranger to unionisation. After the global financial meltdown in 2008, there were attempts to form unions in the IT industry after there were job cuts, but the industry bounced back a year later and hiring by IT companies resumed on full swing.