The Karnataka State IT/ITeS Employees Union (KITU) has condemned Union Minister for Commerce and Industry Piyush Goyal’s remarks suggesting that Indian workers are willing to work beyond conventional office hours and weekends, arguing that the comments could weaken workplace protections for the technology sector.
Goyal made the remarks at the India-Netherlands Business Forum while presenting India as an attractive investment destination. “Nobody in India will tell you it’s 5 o’clock. And certainly, no Indian will ever remind you it’s the weekend,” he said, according to a report by The Hindu.
KITU said the statement effectively gave corporations a free hand to disregard working-hour regulations, weekly holidays and safeguards under labour laws. The union argued that presenting Indian employees as available to employers at all times could normalise extended working hours in an industry already associated with long schedules and high work pressure.
“By projecting that Indian workers will remain available to employers at all hours, including weekends, the Minister is promoting a culture of chattel slavery,” KITU said in its response. The union also equated the Minister’s remarks with an endorsement of practices that undermine workers’ rights, according to the report.
The dispute places working-time expectations in India’s information technology and information technology-enabled services sector at the centre of a wider conversation about how the country markets its workforce to global investors. Bengaluru, home to a large concentration of technology companies and employees, is particularly connected to this question because the sector is closely integrated with international clients and time zones.
For employees, the issue is not limited to the language used in an investment pitch. Expectations around late working, weekend availability and constant connectivity shape how working-hour rules are experienced in practice. KITU’s objection indicates that the union views the remarks as having potential consequences for the enforcement and interpretation of existing labour safeguards, rather than as a casual description of workplace culture.
The report did not include a response from Goyal or the Union Ministry of Commerce and Industry to KITU’s criticism. It also did not establish whether any specific company or employer had changed its working-hour policies following the Minister’s remarks.
The immediate question is therefore whether the remarks remain an investment-promotion statement or become part of a larger dispute over labour protections in the technology industry. KITU has made clear that it considers the distinction significant, particularly where weekend work and availability outside normal office hours are concerned.
