India Inc offers flexibilities to nudge employees to vote

livemint.com:

MUMBAI : A staggering 960 million Indians above 18 years are eligible to vote in the seven-phase national elections starting 19 April; and India's corporate citizens are pulling out all stops to make sure maximum employees join the great democratic exercise. From IT companies like Tata Consultancy Services to e-commerce giants like Amazon, from consultancies such as KPMG to manpower biggies like Quess Corp, India Inc. is offering holidays, remote work, and other flexibilities for employees to have a say in who governs them.

Some are letting their employees travel to cities where they are enrolled as voters, allowing them to work remotely for a few days. HCL Technologies, Bigbasket, Tata Sons, and Panasonic India, among others, have started alerting their employees on their leave, remote work and travel policies this election. "All employees are given special leave to vote as per their office base locations.

Colleagues who need to travel from their official base location to their voting constituency can also avail special leave after informing their performance manager," said consulting and audit firm KPMG India in an email response to Mint. A senior executive of Tata Sons, the holding company of Tata group firms, will give a day off to its employees to cast their votes. Tata Sons' employees are based in Mumbai.

IT service companies with a large number of employees across the country have announced off days for polling. Noida-based HCL Technologies, with 2,24,756 employees, said it will offer leave. Similarly, a Tata Consultancy Services (TCS) executive said India's largest IT firm will offer the day off to employees working in locations where voting is to be held.