E-commerce giant Amazon which was summoned by labour ministry to appear on Tuesday said that the company has not fired any employee, and resignations were voluntary who opted for its separation program on their own by accepting a severance package.
Amazon representatives appeared before the deputy chief labour commissioner of the union labour ministry in Bengaluru on Wednesday. The company denied the allegations, according to people briefed on the matter.
Earlier, the Labour Ministry of India sent a notice to Amazon concerning a complaint filed by Nascent IT employees senate Amazon’s public policy manager asked to attend a hearing on Nov 23.
A Anjanappa, the deputy chief labour commissioner has summoned the company regarding the Voluntary Separation Program (VSP) and directed it to attend this office with all relevant records in the matter either personally or through an authorized representative on the aforesaid date and time without fail. Amazon’s public policy manager, Smitha Sharma, has been asked to attend a hearing on Nov 23.
Earlier, The Nascent Information Technology Employees Senate (NITES) approached the Labour Ministry concerning the layoff of Indian employees at amazon.
“The law of the land is above Amazon policies,” Harpreet Singh Saluja, President, NITES said in a mail.
“As per the provisions of the Industrial Disputes Act the employer cannot, without prior permission from the appropriate government, lay off any employee,” complains said.
As per the reports, the company has given the impacted employees a deadline until November 30 to decide whether they want to resign voluntarily. This has impacted the Livelihood of thousands of employees.
In the letter, NITES said, “It has received complaints from Amazon employees that they are being forced to quit the company voluntarily. The big tech firm also sent a detailed Voluntary Separation Program (VSP) to its employees.”
“The livelihood of hundreds of employees and their families is now vulnerable”, NITES noted.
NITES further said, “Essentially, a lay-off is a condition where the employers are constrained to deny work to their workforce owing to conditions that bring forth a temporary inability to keep their business going which is clearly not a scenario in Amazon’s case.”
Amazon started the layoff process of employees due to cost-cutting measures. The company sent emails to the employees requesting the termination of their services without providing any prior notice to them.
Amazon planned to eliminate 10,000 jobs across all departments. The company has recently started downsizing its headcount globally.
In India, the company has about 7% of Amazon’s total headcount of over 1.5 Mn. This layoff will affect nearly three percent of Amazon’s corporate employees and less than one percent of its global workforce.
Amazon is one of the largest multinational employers in India. It has campus in Hyderabad, several offices in Karnataka and Tamil Nadu. The company has more than 60 fulfilment centres across 16 states.
