IT Workers in India Continue Protests Against Increase in Working Hours

Hundreds of workers from the Information Technology (IT) and IT enabled services (ITes) sectors participated in a protest demonstration organized by the Karnataka State IT/ITes Employees Union (KITU) on August 3 in Bangalore. The workers demanded that the government withdraw a proposed bill extending the workday from 10 to 14 hours per day indefinitely.

The IT sector workers claim that the Karnataka government is planning to normalize a 14-hour workday over the present workday of 10 hours, in order to generate greater profits for corporations at the cost of the wellbeing of workers.

Protesters burnt a symbolic copy of the proposed law, shouting slogans against the longer workday. They also presented a memorandum to the labor department. The gathering was addressed by several office bearers of the KITU, including its president and vice president.

Suhas Adiga, the general secretary of KITU, while addressing the gathering, demanded that the government not proceed with the proposed amendments in the existing law which will be an “attack on worker’s basic right to personal life. The “union will resist any efforts to implement this change,” Adiga promised.

KITU and other unions have been mobilizing against the proposed move from the moment the government’s intentions were made public early last month. They have organized several street and gate meetings, raising awareness about the impact of the increased working hours on IT workers, who are already overworked and facing severe work-induced physical and mental health issues.

The government in India’s Karnataka province, home of the country’s largest IT industry with over 2 million employees, is planning to amend an existing law called “Karnataka Shops and Commercial Establishments Law” which will remove the existing restrictions of working hours and allow IT companies to demand a longer period of work whenever required. The existing law limits the maximum working hours to 10 a day, including overtime. 

Facing strong resistance to extending the workday to 14 hours, the government has paused the introduction of the amendment for now, yet are still trying to justify the move claiming it was urged by the industry. However, the industry body NASSCOM denied last month it ever sought such an extension of the workday.

KITU claims that IT workers in India are already working longer hours than their peers in most other countries. This has resulted in the majority of the workers facing mental or physical health issues. Quoting various studies, KITU claims that over 45% of the IT employees in India are facing depression, and that over 50% workers have serious physical health issues.

KITU cites studies conducted by the International Labor Organization (ILO) and World Health Organization (WHO), which claim that increased working hours raises the risk of death by up to 35%. Longer working hours severely impact workers’ social life and negatively impacts productivity, KITU claims in the press release following the protests on August 3. 

Sooraj Nidiyanga, a secretary of KITU, told Peoples Dispatch that the central concern raised by most of the workers during the campaign against the proposed increase in the working hours was their fear that they will lose whatever little time they have now for their personal life, and that it will become impossible to have work-life balance if the working hours are raised.

KITU also raised the issue of how most of the IT companies in the country are not paying workers adequately in the first place, and that most of them fail to justly compensate for overtime work. KITU is demanding that the government intervene and resolve these issues instead of extending the workday.