No employee was sacked, all resignations were voluntary: Amazon India

Amazon India said that it reviews its employees every year across verticals and checks if the organisation requires realignment

Amazon India has reportedly told the labour ministry that it has not sacked any employee and has only let go of those who accepted the severance package and opted for separation on their own, a report in the Economic Times (ET) said.

This came in response to a petition filed by the Pune-based employee union, Nascent Information Technology Employees Senate (NITES) with labour minister Bhupender Yadav. It claimed that Amazon forcibly terminated a large number of employees in India. Amazon's representative submitted their statement before the deputy labour commissioner of the Union labour ministry in Bengaluru. No representative of Amazon India was present at the hearing, ET added. 

Amazon India said it reviews its employees every year across verticals and checks if it requires realignment. The workers, Amazon stated, were free to choose or reject the realignment scheme. If they accept the scheme, they would get a "fair severance package". 

It maintained that no employee was asked to leave the organisation, rather they were advised to act at their own discretion. 

The company in May had claimed that it has created 1.16 million direct and indirect jobs in India. By 2025, it has pledged to create 2 million in the country. It has offices across Karnataka and Tamil Nadu.   

Over 10,000 laid off, more to follow

Recently, the company laid off 10,000 employees globally making up to 3 per cent of its total workforce. On November 18, Amazon CEO Andy Jassy warned employees that there will be more layoffs at the company in early 2023 "as leaders continue to make adjustments". 

"Those decisions will be shared with impacted employees and organisations early in 2023," he said in a statement late on November 18.

"We haven't concluded yet exactly how many other roles will be impacted (we know that there will be reductions in our Stores and PXT organisations), but each leader will communicate to their respective teams when we have the details nailed down," Sassy added.

"This year's review is more difficult due to the fact that the economy remains in a challenging spot and we've hired rapidly the last several years," said Jassy.

The massive job cuts hit several divisions, especially the Alexa virtual assistant business and the Luna cloud gaming unit.

(With agency inputs)