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Pune IT firms prepare to start operations with 33% employees in lockdown 3.0
Information Technology (IT) firms in Hinjewadi and other parts of the city have commenced preparation to partially open their facilities in keeping with the permission
Information Technology (IT) firms in Hinjewadi and other parts of the city have commenced preparation to partially open their facilities in keeping with the permission granted by the Maharashtra government.
IT companies located in Pimpri-Chinchwad police jurisdiction, which includes the Rajiv Gandhi Infotech Park at Hinjewadi has been allowed to call in 33 per cent of their staff as per orders issued by Sandeep Bishnoi, Pimpri-Chinchwad police commissioner on May 3, a day before lockdown 3.0 came into effect.
Pune is one of the major IT hubs in the country with the IT Park at Hinjewadi alone, employing nearly two lakh people who reside mostly in the Pune and Pimpri-Chinchwad civic areas. Annual software exports from the IT industry in Pune amounts to around $5 billion (Rs 10,000 crore), according to the Hinjewadi Industries Association.
Vinayak Dhakane, deputy commissioner of police, zone-2, under whose jurisdiction the Hinjewadi IT park functions, said, “As employees are not allowed to commute to work by private vehicles, the bigger companies are now approaching us and making bus arrangements for the required number of employees who can come to work.”
“By now, also their system of work-from-home has also developed,” he added.
“One set of passes reached us in the morning and one at 6pm on Wednesday evening (total 263). The pass requires specific names of people travelling in a bus along with the route. The passes are being issued (by police) through HIA. If they had allowed for private vehicles for IT employees, that would been a more convenient option,” said Colonel (retired) Charanjeet Bhogal of the Hinjewadi Industries Association (HIA).
Meanwhile, the Forum for IT Employees (FITE), a union for IT workers in Maharashtra, expressed the view that the employees should be called only after the lockdown is over or when Pune district, which is currently a red zone, comes to green or orange zone.
