Pay cut better than layoff,agrees

When Union Agriculture Minister Sharad Pawar came to discuss the slow down with the city’s indsutrial sector,one of the ideas mooted to combat layoffs was for employees and the top management to take a pay cut. On Thursday it emerged that Baba Kalyani,chairman and managing director of Bharat Forbes,has taken a 20 per cent cut in his pay package. Kalyani,however,tried to play it down. “Everybody is doing it. It is not a big deal,” he said. When asked if others in his company were following his lead,he said that he could not speak for them.

“To the best of my knowledge,there has been no reduction in pay packages till now. But this idea has been mooted and several companies are talking about it,” said Mukesh Malhotra,president of Mahratta Chamber of Commerce Industries and Agriculture.

An industry member also said that pay compensation could be considered as an alternative to laying off good employees in the future,if the economic took a worse turn.