As COVID-19 pandemic forced countries around the world to shut down their business, India was no different. Two-month long lockdown implemented in India starting from March 25 continued till May 31, halt business operations around the country, and COVID hit sectors in India.
Some significant sectors such as IT, Agriculture continued their operations through the use of technology. Others such as Travel, Aviation, Fitness completely collapsed due to their dependence on people.
The International Monetary Fund in its recent estimate said the GDP growth of the country for the present yeat will be worst in last few decades. IMF predicted the Indian economy to recover swiftly in 2021, however, the present situation is forcing companies to layoff their employees.
Fitness Industry
As the lockdown was implemented overnight, gym’s, yoga centers, and other fitness centers closed indefinitely. Gym and other types of fitness equipment are often used by different people which increases the risk of virus spread.
Bangalore based Curefit has laid off hundreds of employees and cut salaries to bring down its operation cost. Founders announced to forgo salaries, the management, and other staff salaries cut by 50-20 percent due to the cut of costs by the company.
“As many as 90 percent of the Cult.Fit trainers continue to be with us and have been moved to a fixed plus variable model to tide over the crisis,” the company said in its press release. However, many Cult.Fit trainers post on their social media accounts that Curefit is forcing them to resign.
Linkedin story
Microsoft owned Linkedin said on July 21, that it will cut nearly 960jobs or 6 percent of the company’s global workforce. According to the company, the coronavirus pandemic left a significant impact on the demand for requirement products it offers.
The company’s business model is to help businesses and employees meet and match one another. Due to the pandemic, fewer companies are hiring which left a deep impact on the company.
“LinkedIn is not immune to the effects of the global pandemic. Our Talent Solutions business continues to be impacted as fewer companies, including ours, need to hire at the same volume they did previously,” said CEO Ryan Roslansky in a blog post by the company.
Indigo Layoff
According to the International Air Transport Association (IATA), the pandemic in 2020 will leave the worst hit on the aviation industry history. In the Asia-Pacific region, the loss is expected to be around $29 billion. India, the world’s biggest growing aviation market will report a loss of $11 billion.
The collapse of the aviation industry and sectors dependent on it is expected to impact 3.06 million jobs. Indigo’s decision to layoff 10 percent of its staff is the beginning of a painful process for the Indian aviation market.
Indigo announced the layoff decision citing the economic crisis triggered by the COVID-19 pandemic. This move is worrying as the company has the strongest balance sheet in the market.
Big Indian IT companies
The Information Industry is laying off thousands of employees citing reasons such as non-performance, lack of projects, and cutting surplus staff in the country. Automation and related technologies already cut many jobs now the pandemic has worsened the situation further.
International Business Machines (IBM) Corp globally has 35,000 employees is cutting 2000 jobs to reshapes its business. India accounts for nearly one-third of the IBM workforce, the impact of layoff on India is not clear.
Cognizant has laid off thousands of its employees in India. Of the 2.9 lakh of the company’s workforce 2 lakh are Indian employees. IT employees in Karnataka and Chennai accused that the company is executing mass layoffs after benching 18,000 employees in India.
Indian IT giants like the Tata Consultancy Services (TCS), Infosys, Wipro, and HCL Technologies have said no plans to conduct mass layoff their employees. Reports suggest performance-based removals are happening in these companies.