India's First IT Union Hits Back As Nasscom Dismisses Mass Layoffs Reports

India's first information technology (IT) workers' union, the Forum for IT Employees (FITE) fired back at industry body Nasscom for dismissing claims of mass layoffs by companies and discouraging formation of unions in the sector. Last week Nasscomm president R Chandrashekhar warned that employee activism or stopping workforce realignment by resorting to regulation will lead to decline in competitiveness and potential loss of existing jobs.

Responding to Mr Chandrashekhar's comments, FITE released a statement Monday claiming that IT companies have been using appraisal process to shield themselves and quoting "poor performance" to terminate employees.

"It's our rights to question the termination process, and its organisation's duty to give us answers. If this is called employees activism, shall we say NASSCOM is Employer's activism?" FITE said.

The IT union which is in the process of getting itself registered formally as the first union for techies in India also said that it is the responsibility of the employer's to foresee the change in technological trend and re-skill the employees accordingly.

In the last month, major Indian IT players including Infosys, Wipro, Tech Mahindra and Cognizant have initiated performance reviews, a move that could see thousands of mid-level workers being shown the door. FITE has approached labour commission of Chennai and Hyderabad and said it would also approach the labour commission in Bengaluru to submit a petition to stop the alleged "illegal terminations" of Cognizant employees.

The information technology and business process management industry has grown at a healthy clip for nearly two decades, but protectionist policies in the West and increased automation have led to job losses in the recent past with some analysts estimating layoffs at over two lakh per year.