Back to full WFH: As infections surge, companies shut offices again in all major cities

The massive second wave of Covid-19, with accompanying state-level lockdowns and curfews, has swept away all of India Inc’s schedules of phased working from office. Companies across regions and sectors are asking white-collar employees to go back to full work from home (WFH) mode, even in cities not under lockdown.

Leading companies and conglomerates, including Infosys, TCS, ITC, IBM, Raymond, InMobi, Motilal Oswal Financial Services, Dunzo, Deloitte, SAP India, ManpowerGroup, Quess Corp, BookMyShow, PolicyBazaar and RPG Enterprises have asked employees to WFH. Companies are sending out WFH advisories, not only to employees in the most affected states, but also in other regions as a precautionary measure.

Infosys, where a majority of employees have been working from home, has advised staying at home, with chief operating officer Pravin Rao sending an email to staff. ITC has closed its offices and advised employees to continue WFH, said Amitav Mukherji, head, corporate human resources, ITC.



The likes of TCS and IBM will continue WFH until June-end, while SAP India Labs instructed all employees to work from home, including the near 10% workforce that started going to office recently. SAP India Labs has started vaccination for eligible employees at its Bengaluru campus.

“We were proactive in taking precautionary measures and advised our office staff total work from home starting April 5,” said KA Narayan, president, HR, Raymond. “We will continue with this measure till the situation gets under control.”

Mumbai-headquartered broking company Motilal Oswal Financial Services has once again advised the majority of its staff across the country to WFH. “Even though stock market operations come under essential services..,” said Sudhir Dhar, its executive director and head of human resources.

IT, ITeS Better Prepared
“We have minimised staff presence in office to only essential functions,” said Dhar of Motilal Oswal.

In a message to employees, InMobi founder Naveen Tewari said he had personally dealt with seven to eight deaths in the past 24 hours. This is a dire situation, he said in an audio clip, adding that the only way to deal with it was for everyone to stay indoors. “I’m not trying to create alarm but… let’s not take this lightly,” said Tewari’s message.

Industry officials say the IT and enabled services industry is better prepared this time to deal with lockdowns announced in many parts of the country, including New Delhi, since a majority part of its workforce is already working remotely.

An industry official who did not wish to be named, said, “In places like Maharashtra, they have allowed IT in the essential services list. The Delhi lockdown will not have much impact as most of the industry’s workforce is centred in Noida and Gurgaon. There were some companies which had started calling back 10-15% of their workforce but since the surge, many are going back to remote working.”

Cloud data protection management firm Druva, which had started allowing small groups to meet in office, has discontinued the practice as cases in Pune — where most of its Indian workforce is based — started to rise, said Jaspreet Singh, its chief executive.

Many offices had begun opening in a staggered manner since January as the number of daily cases reduced and there was hope after vaccination started.

“We were working with 30% employees in office by March, and planned to gradually increase to 40% in Q1, but have reverted to preferred mode, WFH, for everyone,” said Lohit Bhatia, president, Quess Corp.

(Additional reporting by Ayan Pramanik in Bengaluru, Surabhi Agarwal and Ratna Bhushan in New Delhi)