Majority of IT firms eye shift out of Haryana

A majority of IT-ITeS firms in Haryana were willing to shift operations to other States/ countries as they fear the the Haryana State Employment of Local Candidates Bill, 2020, providing 75% job reservation for locals, could adversely impact operations and hiring, as per a Nasscom study.

Given the Act applies to new hires, the impact is expected to be severe in 1-2 years as the industry sees a high attrition rate. Some 80% of the companies that participated in the study stated that the new law will negatively impact their future business operations and investment plans, A majority of them said this would result in shifting/ growing their operations to other States and in other countries, as per the study.

The study was conducted between March 4-7 among 70 IT-ITeS firms in the State, to understand the impact of the new law. Over 500 IT-ITeS firms in Haryana employ over four lakh people directly.

It further said the majority of the survey participants expressed concerns over recruitment strategies as the law would significantly increase the compliance burden and therefore limit the industry’s ability to hire people at will.

“Such a legislation will also make it difficult to adopt and follow diversity and inclusion policies and initiatives and will lead to discriminations,” it observed.

Nasscom study also found Haryana faced various skill gaps, where salaries are less than ₹50,000 per month, in the areas of communication (written and spoken), AI, Machine Learning, Analytical and Statistical skills, finance and accounting, programming, Data Science, R&D and engineering.