Working the IT way

My company has been acquired by another one and its changes all around. The biggest of all and the one that’s taking a toll on me is the change in office timings. Previously it used to be 8.5 hours per day and now it is 9.5 hours! And considering the traffic in Bangalore which takes almost two hours of my time traveling to office, it wouldn’t be a surprise that I reach home totally worn out.

A couple of year’s back I had a correspondence with my professor, who taught us a course called Legal Aspects of Business, regarding working hours of employees in the IT industry. As you know people in the IT industry (especially fresh graduates) are made to work for long hours in the office. Here, I saw a stark contradiction with the labor laws in the country which prevents employees from working more than 8 hours a day.

Lemme copy-paste here the mail conversation we had. I hope my professor wouldn’t mind me doing it.

Jithu wrote:
Hello Sir,

Hope you are doing fine. My name is Sujith and I belonged to the class of 2006 of IIMA and had attended your LAB sessions. :-). Indeed informative they were.

I had a doubt regarding the labor laws of India and I am sure you can give a comment on it. The doubt is regarding the working hours of employees in IT companies. Is it governed by the same Factories Act of 1948 (http://indiacode.nic.in/fullact1.asp?tfnm=194863) or some amendments have been made to this act for IT companies to follow? Most of the IT companies force people to work till late night (more than 9 hours a day). Isn’t it illegal according to this act?

I hope you are not much busy with acads to clarify my doubt.
Thanks & Regards,


Prof. wrote:
Thanks for the email Sujith.

Please remember that all these labor laws are meant for the ‘labor’ (blue collared) and people about whom you are mentioning (white collared) are not covered under the definition. There is no law to fix hours for the working of executives. Labor laws are enacted to prevent exploitation of poor, whereas executives are capable enough of protecting themselves, hence, there is no law for them.
Regards,


Jithu wrote:
Sir,

Thank you very much for the clarification.

Somewhere feel bad when I see guys who are recruited directly from engineering colleges are put into work up to around 17 hours a day in various IT companies. I strongly feel they also require protection. Executives are supposed to be capable of protecting themselves, but the question is whether they are actually able to do that or not. The question becomes who is being exploited here.

Once again, thank you very much for your prompt response Sir. :-)
Have a nice day..


Prof. wrote:
To take it a bit further.....
Engineers who work for 17 hours have a choice to join a company which pays less and makes them work for lesser hours. It is a choice which the engineers have themselves made out of their own sweet will. Senior management professionals/govt. officers/military officers/business persons, etc. are on the job 24 hours.
For labor, there would be no such work available and employers would exploit them, hence the law.
Regards,


Jithu wrote:
Yeah that’s true Sir, they do have a choice. Can be considered as something they choose for themselves for the handsome bucks they earn.

What you said is true Sir; the act is not meant to put a limit to the working hours, but to prevent exploitation.

Sir, if I could talk a bit about the choice part. Even though they have a choice, most of the IT companies out there, work in the same fashion. Also India is an unemployment high country that most of the times; it’s a matter of getting a job than anything else and people tend to choose the option that’s at hand without thinking much about the working hours and nowadays it has become kind of a norm in IT companies.

Thanks very much for these valuable insights Sir.
It was nice to be in touch with you once again.. :-)

Sujith

So, working for long hours is something which we IT guys choose by ourselves. But my question is how many of us did that by a choice? Did we have options? Somewhere I feel our situation is much more pathetic than the blue collared employees. Do we now need a law for protecting people working in IT?

Hmm.. Guess, I have no other options but to adjust myself to the new timings... So here I am at the office everyday at 9 am till it rings 6:30 pm!

PS: How long will it take for one to complete a short story? Well, for me its two years and is still not over!

From E-Company

E-Company: “The Loot” Marthahally, Bangalore

What my friend had undergone at a shop in Bangalore..

Little Ironies

With a pamphlet in his hand, Moin looked contented. A sales agent of his cell phone service provider gave him that. In the pamphlet, there was plan for Rs. 2500 with which one could make unlimited calls to anywhere in India. That was what made him so happy. Because, with that he could make as many number of calls he want and talk his heart out to his friends and relatives.

Few days back, he had sent me a forward. There was a cartoon of a person with a cell phone in his ear and fumes coming out from his head in the forward. And a tagline that read, “Excessive use of cell phones may cook your brains alive”.

Why would the cell phone service provider be bothered about all those?

A bit of security

Renu had just moved in to Bangalore to join her new job. These days, the first thing one would do after shifting her location is to get a cell phone connection; even before finding a house to settle in. Thank God, most of the service providers gave out corporate connections which made the task of getting a new connection much easier. Also the corporate connection would save her from giving huge deposits to activate STD facility to call back home and a company letter to surrogate local address proof.

The company had a representative of a famous mobile phone service provider visiting their campus every afternoon to assist people take new connections. Renu was more than happy when she came to know about this. The very next day she joined her company Renu went and saw the sales representative and enquired about the formalities of taking a new connection.

The ever obliging sales guy replied with a pleasant smile on his face. “Madam, please give me your passport size photograph, a copy of your company ID card, a photo copy of your credit card; both sides, a cancelled check leaf of your salary account, your address proof or company letter and your pay slip. Your connection will be activated tomorrow itself.”

‘Hey, isn’t he asking a bit too much of a requirement? Especially copy of both sides of my credit card and a cancelled check leaf of my salary account! Anyone who is seeing the copy of my credit card can note down the card number and the CVV number and do online transactions using that and in the check leaf, my account number and bank name are there, which are like confidential information. Also you don’t know who all see these photocopies.’ Having thought about this, she decided to ask the sales guy.

“Why do you want copies of both sides of my credit card and a cancelled check leaf?”

“Those are required madam.”

“But why? They are confidential information and can’t be shared.”

The sales guy’s face started to change. Bit annoyed, he handed over one pamphlet to Renu. He also showed a few photocopies of both sides of credit card given by some employees of her company. Some of them haven’t even darkened the CVV number on the back side of their credit card!

The following were written under various plans offered by the provider.

Documents Required
1. One passport size photograph
2. A photocopy of the ID card
3. Photocopy of the credit card for SI (both side) OR cancelled check leaf for ECS
4. Local address proof or company letter
5. Pay slip photocopy for STD, ISD and Roaming facilities

She started asking doubts one by one and that’s when things started to unfold.

Credit card photocopy shall be asked when one wants her bill to be credited to her credit card and it also serves the purpose of signature verification. Whereas a cancelled check leaf shall be asked when one wants to enable auto debit of her bills from her bank account and it also serves the purpose of signature verification. By having these details, the cell phone service providers mitigate the risk. On inquiring further, she got to know that the signature verification can be done by giving photocopies of her driving license or passport. By not choosing her bill to be auto debited from her account or credited to her credit card and with a refundable deposit of Rs. 400 she can even do away with the cancelled check and photocopies of credit card!

She gave one passport size photo, a photocopy of her ID card, a photo copy of her license, a company letter as she hasn’t taken a house yet and a deposit of Rs. 400 to take the connection. She gave a copy of her offer letter in lieu of salary slip. She wondered what she would do with those people who have already submitted their credit card and bank account details.

Most of the times, we just need to inquire a bit more.