Pune-based IT labour rights non-profit Nascent Information Technology Employees Senate (NITES) has filed an official government complaint against HCL Technologies, India’s third largest IT company, alleging the business has instituted a policy to claw back bonuses from resigning employees.
What is India Payment of Bonus Act?
Payment of bonus is the statutory liability on the employer and receipt of bonus amount is the legal right of the employee and the amount to be paid, to whom to be paid and by when to be paid has been well framed in the Payment of Bonus Act… The employees resigned from the service also are entitled to bonus for their tenure. Employees can be disqualified for a bonus on three conditions: fraud; riotous or violent behavior while on the premises of the establishment; or theft, misappropriation or sabotage of any property of the establishment.
– HCL technologies is an IT services biz it says that matter mentioned by NITES is incorrectly reported. HCL says “As a law-abiding organization, HCL follows the best HR practices and continues to honour commitments and work in a fair and equitable manner towards all employees.”
The president of IT labor rights nonprofit NITES, Harpreet Singh Saluja, said that his organization had received 20-30 complaints per day since HCL allegedly began enforcing its new Employee Performance Bonus (EPB) policy on January 2nd.
In a mail from HCL Technologies in November 2021 “HCL will be giving monthly bonus If an employee leaves mid-year, the amount paid in that year to the last working day (LWD) will be recovered. According to the email, the LWD will be taken as 31 March 2022, so if a staff member leaves on 3rd March 2022, the amount paid from 1st April 2021 through to 28th February 2022 will be recovered.
HCL says “HCL Technologies is strictly compliant with all relevant rules and regulations and is committed to pay wages to all employees in accordance with applicable laws.”