COVID-19: No job, salary cuts so far but can't say about future, says HUL

FMCG major Hindustan Unilever CMD Sanjiv Mehta on Thursday said the company has not cut any jobs or salary of employees so far due to the coronavirus pandemic but cannot say what will happen in future.

Addressing a media conference call on the company's quarterly earnings, Mehta said Hindustan Unilever (HUL) has already taken various cost saving measures but steps for the road ahead will depend on how the economy behaves after the country emerges from the health crisis.

"Right now we have not shed any jobs and at this stage we have not done any salary cuts, but I would not be able to say what is going to happen in the future because we will have to see how the situation evolves," he said.

Elaborating further, Mehta said, "If for instance the economy bounces back then we are into business but if we get into deep depression then we will revaluate all the steps that we have been taking. We always keep options open because we evaluate everything very closely. We have to evaluate, we have the options that we can exercise in future."
Stressing that "the ethos of HUL is very frugal", Mehta said, "We have a very close focus on each of the lines of P&L (profit and loss) and we look very closely to ensure we add value and drive value to the business."