IT companies to allow Work From Home? Employees’ Union Pushes For Remote Work After PM Modi’s Appeal

The ongoing conflict in West Asia has raised concerns over fuel supplies and costs, bringing the debate around working from home back to India — this time, not due to a pandemic, but to conserve fuel.

The Nascent Information Technology Employees Senate (NITES), an association of IT employees in India, on Monday appealed to the Centre to issue an official advisory to IT and IT-enabled services companies to adopt work from home to the extent operationally possible.

In a letter to Union Labour and Employment Minister Mansukh Mandaviya on May 11, accessed by ET Now, NITES said the step could go a long way in reducing fuel consumption, traffic congestion and unnecessary travel at a time when India is facing mounting economic pressure due to global geopolitical tensions.

Why does the NITES want a work-from-home advisory?

The employee body connected its demand to a recent public call by Prime Minister Narendra Modi asking citizens and organisations to take fuel-saving measures in the prevailing global energy crisis.

The letter NITES referred to the prime minister’s call for practices such as work from home, virtual meetings and reduced travel as part of wider austerity measures.

The association described Modi’s message as “a national call for collective responsibility.

The demand comes when rising crude oil prices and disruptions related to the West Asia conflict are putting pressure on India’s fuel import bill and forex reserves.

IT sector already has a proven remote model

NITES said that the Indian IT and ITES sectors have already demonstrated during the Covid-19 pandemic that work from home can go on smoothly without impacting productivity or business continuity.

The association said software companies, customer support centres, multinational companies and digital service providers continued servicing global clients and delivering projects remotely for many years.

“The experience of the pandemic has clearly established that mandatory work from home in suitable IT roles is practical, technologically feasible and operationally sustainable,” NITES said in its May 11 letter.

The association added that during the pandemic years, companies had already poured a lot of money into cloud infrastructure, cybersecurity systems and collaboration tools, and workers had adapted well to remote work models.

Are daily office commutes adding to the fuel burden?

NITES also pointed out the increasing burden of daily commuting in metro cities.

The association said that lakhs of employees still commute long distances daily, but many IT jobs are digitally deliverable. This increases fuel use, congestion on the roads and pressure on public transport systems, said the employee body.

It noted that workers in large cities frequently spend several hours commuting for work that can easily be done remotely.

The union also argued that unnecessary travel is not only impacting the well-being of workers, but it is also adding to the environmental stress the country is actively discussing conservation measures to address.

WFH Should Be Considered A ‘National-Support Measure’

Interestingly, NITES introduced work from home not as an employee convenience or corporate flexibility policy but as a larger economic support measure aligned with the national interest.

The association said WFH should be considered “a responsible economic and national support measure in accordance with the Hon’ble Prime Minister’s appeal.

NITES also urged the Labour Ministry to issue an advisory to IT and digitally deliverable sectors to implement mandatory work from home wherever possible for an appropriate period.

PM Modi’s fuel conservation drive picks up steam

The renewed work-from-home debate comes in the wake of Prime Minister Modi’s speech in Hyderabad on Sunday where he urged Indians to embrace austerity measures similar to those during the Covid period.

The Prime Minister called for reducing petrol and diesel use by increasing public transport, carpooling, and work-from-home arrangements in response to rising energy costs and disruptions in fuel supplies caused by the West Asia conflict.

Fuel conservation will be added to the wider economic discussion, and corporate life may be looking again at hybrid and remote working – but this time for energy security reasons, not for public health. 

Also Read: Why PM Modi Wants Indians To Work From Home | Explained