Today, their efforts have come in the formation of India’s first independent union formed by information technology employees. The forum is in the process of getting itself registered as an official union. There were previous attempts to create such a union, but it was in vain. “Normally, the middle class has an aversion to political activity,” said J Jayaprakash, a member of the forum, to Scroll. 

In the recent times, the IT sector of India has been facing a pinch. According to Mint, almost 4.5% of the IT employees are to lose their jobs in the upcoming months. It also added that about 56,000 employees of IT companies like Infosys, Wipro and Cognizant are expected to lose their jobs over the next year. During such tough times, the employees decided to join hands for a collective good. Jayaprakash said, “Since we ourselves are IT employees who have started this, people trust us to take up their issues. It is a homegrown solution to their problems.”

The information technology wing of the New Democratic Labour Front, a labor union that is active in Tamil Nadu and Puducherry, is another such group of IT professionals. This group came at the same time as the Forum for Information Technology Employees and got the government to clarify that IT professionals are allowed to form a union. However, forming such unions have not been common in the IT field. Due to the immense growth in the sector, not much resistance is seen amongst the IT employees.

After a long time, a union has been formed. An executive of NASSCOM confirmed that it has no say in the matter and also said, “Unions can be formed by employees. It is up to the state government, employees and companies.”