While Bus Day is being hailed by many as an initiative for a cleaner and greener city, it is giving IT firms sleepless nights.
They fear that shared transport will facilitate poaching in an industry that is severely hit by high attrition rate.
The third Bus Day was observed on Wednesday. The concept is being promoted by the Bangalore Metropolitan Transport Corporation (BMTC) to popularise public transport among IT professionals.
“Companies are wary of encouraging employees to share transport for commuting as they fear poaching,” an HR executive of an IT firm told DNA. “Sharing transport gives employees a chance to talk about and get details of vacancies in other companies and also swap CVs. Companies are concerned since attrition is high in the industry,” the HR executive said not wanting to be named. “Moreover, company secrets may also get leaked during casual gossips.”
“This fear may be stalking some companies,” Vishwanath Sitaram, general secretary of Outer Ring Road Companies Association, said. “We will call a meeting of BMTC officials and IT companies operating on the Outer Ring Road to see if separate buses can be provided for each company,” he said.
Some experts dismissed the theory that Bus Day was not being widely embraced because IT companies were not promoting it fearing attrition. “The fear of attrition may be genuine,” Ashwin Mahesh, a member of the ABIDe task force, said. “But there are many other reasons for the concept not getting popular. The timings and availability of buses is a major problem. This dissuades many people from taking public transport,” he said.
Officials of the Electronic City Industries Association (ECIA) said there was a 10% to 15% fall in the use of private transport in Electronic City on Bus Day on Wednesday.
The BMTC claimed there was a 20% fall across the five corridors covered on Bus Day. “On Wednesday, we had additional 150 bus services on the five corridors,” a BMTC official said. “About 50 extra buses plied on the inner ring and outer ring roads,” the official said.
According to ECIA officials, there has been an increase in the number of employees using public transport ever since the concept of Bus Day started three months ago.
