New Delhi: Plush offices, jaw-dropping salaries, pampering HR, weekend parties, five-day working weeks -- can BPO workers have any such grievances that may require them to stand up as an union against the management and strike work?
"Yes, they do," say Indian trade unions. In fact, various trade union bodies like the Centre of Indian Trade Unions (CITU) have already begun a nationwide effort to rope in BPO workers into their folds.
The unions have their own arguments in favour of bringing the BPOs under their realm: odd working hours, work life stress, health hazards, fringe benefit tax, the power of collective bargaining, women’s security, psychological pressures etc.
So what are they doing to conquer the impregnable BPO fortress? Trade union bodies first made an appeal to the BPO managements to take initiatives for the formation of workers' unions. But there was no taker for this advice in the industry. The unions then appealed to the BPO employees to form unions. This also evoked no response at all.
And in a third attempt, they are now considering a direct membership route to entice BPO employees into their folds. "Just because some people smile at you, address you by your first name, give you an AC or a cup of coffee doesn’t democratise the whole culture. We have no fight with the management, they too are sans power. The actual decision-making power here vests with the capital facet and that is what we are objecting to,” CyberMedia News quotes CITU president Ajit Abhyankar as saying.
The BPO industry says it can ill-afford trade unionism in their premises. For one, the industry has very unique business patterns. It simply can't afford an employee strike or protest even for an hour in a 24 x 7 work environment.
Secondly, the industry works in a very competitive environment in which it could be almost perilous to overlook any staff welfare concerns. Employee-friendliness is a norm here, not an exception, they say. "No BPO company today can afford to ignore these factors given the demand-supply inequation. In a space where open-door policy, fat pay checks, parties, five-day week are the norms, what will unions do," Mudassar Virani, the assistant manager of operations at IBM Daksh in Pune, reasons in a chat with CyberMedia News.
Thirdly, when it comes to odd working hour and things like that, for the BPO industry it's a business requirement, not a management policy. "Everyone who joins a BPO is checked on his/her willingness to work in shifts at the inception itself. And that’s precisely why BPO employees get a fat salary and other facilities that are unheard of in any other industry," the industry leaders point out.
Trade unions won't buy any of this. "Call centres should be governed by a special law or amendments to Industrial Disputes Act should be done wherein every employee, even an executive below a certain rank should be considered a workman," they say. They argue that BPOs cannot be allowed to run as sweatshops and let employees compromise on their dignity.
They now threaten to resort to collective expression to get the BPO employee his or her right. They can even go to extent of giving boycott calls and holding demonstrations against particular companies, they say.
While as on date this remains a threat, it is not too far when the trade unions might take this campaign to the streets given the clout they now enjoy with the Left backing from the corridors of power.
It is also possible that trade unionism will ultimately make a quiet entry into the BPO space from West Bengal, a citadel of trade unionism where the industry has been growing by leaps and bounds in the recent months.
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