Wipro’s White Lie : Never Asked Anyone to Resign!

NDLF IT Employees Wing  had raised an Industrial Dispute last July at Labour Department (Kuralagam) Chennai on behalf of some Wipro employees who were victims of unfair labour practices by the management. They were given unfair low rating, denied project, kept in bench and were being forced to resign. Since then the reconciliation proceedings are going on every two weeks or so.

In a letter submitted to labour department Wipro management claims that “the company at no stage or time has ever indulged in calling upon any of its employees to resign from services”. We call upon the thousands of employees who were forced to resign and others who were facing such threats to respond and share their experiences.

During several rounds of meetings, our union has submitted the employees’ grievances in writing and gave proofs. Wipro management responded denying all our complaints and claimed that the company “at no stage or time has ever indulged in calling upon any of its employees to resign from services” (We call upon the thousands of employees who were forced to resign and others who were facing such threats to respond and share their experiences).

(This letter was given by Wipro in September 2017. We are publishing this information now to create awareness among IT/ITES employees that None of the corporates admit that they ask any one to resign. They always claim that employees leave on their own.

Anyone in any IT/ITES company facing HR threat for forced resignation, DO NOT RESIGN, IT IS NOT COMPANY’S OFFICIAL POLICY to ask employee to resign.

The company also said that keeping an employee in bench is a regular procedure. We gave proper replies to the administrative and legal points raised by Wipro management.

The most recent sitting was scheduled on 28th February and it lasted for more than 1 hour.

Management side started by saying they had forced no one to resign. In response to this, union office bearers refuted this contention and Wipro employees started to recount their own experiences. Management objected and said “all should not talk” and “employees should not attend the proceedings”. Union office bearers retorted to them saying office bearers only are replying and whenever required victim employees are intervening to tell the actual happenings. It is the conciliation officer who decides as to who to attend and who to speak in the reconciliation meetings.

Management side claimed this dispute reconciliation no longer has any relevance as some employees are given project and others will also be allocated in due course.

We replied, “You have been telling this for the last 8 months. But, you are not forthcoming to say when exactly project will be given. In addition, you have sent an email to one of the employees party to industrial dispute stating that as you are involved in 2k case, your project allocation is on hold” and showed them a copy of that email. They fumbled and claimed that we had misinterpreted the message. But when it was shown to them that it is indeed an unambiguous mail they replied they will reply to it after getting clarification.

We insisted on 3 important demands:

1. Give Quarterly Performance Linked Compensation (QPLC) to those who were forced to sit in bench and there by denied this compensation.
2. Allocate projects immediately to all aggrieved employees in this dispute.
3. Abolish appraisal system which is used as a tool to cut salary and to extract forced resignations illegally.

We pointed out that we have submitted complaints and evidence. But the management brush aside the grievances arrogantly instead of giving proper replies.

Conciliation officer told the management that they should submit the procedure used for fixing the salaries as a response to the complaint regarding QPLC raised by the union on behalf of employees. In addition, the officer advised Wipro management to submit all the documents they have submitted so far in Tamil so as to avoid difference of interpretation as happened even that day with respect to the HR email.
The management representatives, after consulting someone over phone, refused to comply. They also refused to even sign the meeting minutes.

The Wipro management, from the very beginning of the case, has been flatly denying the grievances of the employees, brushing aside our proofs and disrespecting the legal procedures.

Fighting the case relentlessly and re-establishing the rights of employees is important not only to Wipro employees but also all IT/ITES employees.

– Compiled by : Sugendiran
Translated by : Nesan