IT units may enjoy permanent exemption on working hours in Odisha

To give operational ease to the information technology (IT) units, the state IT department has sought permanent exemption on their working hours from the labour and employees' state insurance department in line with the practice followed in other states.

Based on the provisions of the state Information & Communications Technology (ICT) policy-2004, the labour & employment department had issued a notification in 2008 on the working hours for IT & ITes units. The notification offered exemption to such units from the purview of Sections 9, 10, 11, and 23 of the Odisha Shops and Commercial Establishments Act, 1956 initially for two years. The notification had expired since October 2010.

"It is pertinent to mention that the IT& ITes industry operates in 24/7 operating model due to time zone difference to meet the offshore customer's requirement. Due to round the clock nature of work, women employees are also engaged in night shift operations as substantial number of womaen employees are engaged in the IT/ITes industries", IT secretary Madhusudan Padhi wrote to the labour & employees' state insurance department.

Since the exemption has already expired without having any extension, the IT and ITes industries are facing tremendous problem in deploying the women employees in different time zones, he stated. Without this exemption, IT companies are not able to deploy certain skills to meet the client need which is seriously impacting their operations and leading to cancelation of projects and contracts as represented by the industry, he added.

"The draft ICT policy 2013 envisages permanent exemption to IT & ITes industries under Sections 9, 10, 11 and 23 of the Odisha Shops and Commercial Establishments Act, 1956 and growth driven incentives to further stimulate the IT sector. I would like to request you for issuing notification for permanent exemption of IT/ITes industry from the above referred sections under Odisha Shops and Commercial Establishments Act, 1956", the letter stated.