There has been a spike in IT professionals knocking on the doors of labour commissioners, asking them to intervene in ­cases of alleged “wrongful” ret­renchment or lay-offs. “A rec­ent response by a labour commissioner in Pune to a query filed under the Right to Information Act revealed that 22 of the 25 petitions in the past 10 years were filed this year alone,” says Ela­varasan Raja, general secretary of ­Forum of IT Employees (FITE), Maharashtra. The forum, which provides support to affected IT workers, has seen the number of petitions by affec­ted individuals rising not just in Pune, but in most IT hubs, including Bangalore and Chennai. Tech Mahindra, Vodafone, Syntel, Wipro, Capgemini, Technosoft, JP Morgan, HTC Global, CTS and HP Enterprise are among companies against whom petitions have been filed so far.

“Across India, more than 30,000 emp­loyees have been retrenched so far this year,” says Raja, alleging that IT companies don’t always reveal the number of people who have been handed the pink...