Indian IT majors such as Infosys, Tech Mahindra, Tata Consultancy Services (TCS), and Wipro have been striving hard over the past couple of months to bring back employees and their families stuck overseas due to COVID-related travel restrictions.
So far, IT firms have brought back over 2,000 employees to India through chartered flights and the government's repatriation flights, The Economic Times reported.
Many of these companies have employees working primarily out of the US, and other locations such as the UK, Australia, Japan and Europe. Several want to come home since they are working remotely.
Wipro and Tech Mahindra had also chartered flights to get their employees back from the US last week.
"Last week, we have also brought back employees from Japan, and are working towards bringing back associates who are stranded in similar situations from other locations like Europe and Australia," said Harshvendra Soin, global chief people officer at Tech Mahindra told the publication.
"Employees were also brought home from the UK via the Vande Bharat Mission flight. These included employees whose visas have either expired or are close to expiry. Plans are afoot to organize charter flights from Australia later this month," A Wipro spokesperson told the paper.
TCS has brought back around 900 employees based in different countries since the COVID-19 outbreak began.
Experts told the paper that while health and safety of employees is the primary concern, such moves also make business sense.
"It helps to save or realign the cost also for service providers. If someone who is not required overseas is kept overseas, it adds to the cost for service providers," said Pareekh Jain, founder of outsourcing advisory firm Pareekh Consulting.
