Even after 3.4 yrs of dedicated service to the company, the employee is denied smooth exit

Few days back Ganesan, an IT employee contacted FITE and register a complaint about his employer Agastha Software Private Limited located at SIPCOT Complex Siruseri,OMR IT Corridar, Chennai. Ganesan, joined Agastha Software as fresher in the role of Software Engineer in the month of May,2014. He dedicated his valuable 3.4 years at Agastha. Agastha is health care product startup company employed around 30 people. Ganesan worked including night shifts. He started his carrier at the pay scale of Rs.12,000. After 3.4 yrs of dedicated service, he were able to get only Rs.22,000. There is demand of Rs.21,000 minimum wage for all workers in India from the trade unions in our country. To meet his changing livelihood needs, he decided to look for good employment offers from Industry. He expressed his wish to quit the company to the management in the month of April,2017.

As Ganesan was one of the critical resource in the development of the one of product of the company, he was requested to stay with the company for some more time. He agreed and assured the company to postpone his decision of quitting the company. Again after 4 months, in the month of September,2017, he met the management and requested to accept his resignation. The project manager and HR advised him to send resignation email on 4 Sep 2017 and the relieving order and other documents will be sent by post. He was told that there is no notice period, he need not report to the company.

But as assured by Agastha, Ganesan did not receive his reliving order and other documents. He tried to contact his Director Rangiah Naidu Korrappatti and HR Sakthivel. Director had abused verbally during the telephonic conversion with Ganesan. He said “Agastha Software is small company, there is no law for it to follow, you have separated from the company, so we need not worry about you, we will not give any documents”. He also said ” we have requested from the company to stay back for some more time, but you have not listened to us, so why we should worry about you?” Ganesan has requested politely that it is his future and kindly give him the relieving order etc., But all his pleas fell in the deaf ears of the management. Finally Ganesan phone calls and mails were not responded. He was even not allowed to meet anybody from management not even allowed inside the company.

Ganesan and his another colleague reported to FITE that Agastha Software for most of the employees quitting the company is not giving relieving order and other documents. It is one of their tactics to retain the employees. The company have the 30 months bonding period when they recruit the people. They confiscate the original certificates of the employees. Surprise, they dont even provide the payslips and PF details. During his employment with Agastha Software, Ganesan tried to apply for personal loan. He requested payslips from the company, but it was not provided, finally, he was unable to get the loan.

Apart from all these violations, Even when there was no work at office, Ganesan was asked to come to office and do the duty of watchman during the absence of security guard in the night time. This has happened to many of other colleagues also. Agastha Software has violated the labour laws of this country. This is condemnable.

FITE with the complaint from Ganesan, first sent a mail to management demanding to provide the documents including relieving order to Ganesan. After no response from the management, On 28 Sep 2017, around 8 FITE members from Siruseri, including President Parimala, General Secretary Sathiesh and employee Ganesan, went to meet the HR. The gate was locked and we were stopped outside the gate. Nobody was ready to even meet us. We gave the complaint Ganesan sent to us and the mail we sent to management to the security gaurd. We told security guard someone responsible for that branch office should come and meet us.

Finally Selvakumar, team lead and one more person came out and met us. We were told to come Tuesday or Wednesday as the HR is out of station. But we asked Selvakumar to call the HR and fix the appointment right in front of us. The HR tried to escape from fixing the appointment and asked us to confirm it on Tuesday.We repeatedly told them to fix the appointment immediately otherwise we will not leave. We have demanded them to settle the issue in the next meeting and respond to our mail immediately.

Ganesan has formally sent resignation mail. But the management did not either accept the resignation or reject. They are dare enough to say that they will not give the reliving order. This is very much unfair. Ganesan is in distress as he fear that he will loose the opportunity of getting another job in the industry.  FITE request the employees to stand in solidarity with Ganesan.