‘PF Near You’ to be held on November 11

01/11/2019,CHENNAI

Employees’ Provident Fund Organisation (EPFO) will conduct ‘PF Near You, Nidhi Aapke Nikat’ in its regional offices in Royapettah, Tambaram and Ambattur from 10.30 a.m. to 5 p.m. on November 11. Those willing to participate may register their names with the Public Relations Officers by furnishing their PF code number/account number, and nature of grievance, on or before November 5.

Only 9.7% of doctors still on strike, claims Health Minister

01/11/2019, SPECIAL CORRESPONDENT, CHENNAI

Up in arms: Government doctors taking part in a protest on Thursday. S. R. Raghunathan

Health Minister C. Vijayabaskar on Thursday said only 9.7% of a total of 16,475 government doctors were still striking work. He extended the deadline for the doctors to report for duty to Friday morning.

However, doctors affiliated to the Federation of Government Doctors’ Association (FOGDA) refuted the Minister’s claims, saying that more than 60% of the doctors from across the State were still taking part in the indefinite strike, even as the government was threatening to transfer many of them and declare their posts vacant.

The Minister said as many as 1,163 doctors were still on strike. “On the side of the Directorate of Public Health and Preventive Medicine, doctors attached to the Primary Health Centres (PHC) in Cuddalore, Tiruppur, Villupuram, Sankarankoil and Ramanathapuram have returned to duty today. Doctors attached to medical college hospitals in places like Madurai, Vellore and Dharmapuri have returned to work,” he told reporters.

Transfer orders issued

Health Secretary Beela Rajesh said transfer orders had been issued to nearly 70 striking doctors. “We have a list of 5,000 doctors waiting [for appointment] from our last round of selection through the Medical Services Recruitment Board. We have classified them, and there are a number of specialists and super specialists available,” she said.

A. Ramalingam, convenor of FOGDA, said 60% to 70% of the doctors were still participating in the strike across the State. “Our strike continues,” he said.

The Tamil Nadu Medical Officers’ Association said 4,500 out of a total of 6,000 medical officers of PHCs were still striking work, while the rest were handling emergencies, deliveries and fever cases at block PHCs.

Agitating doctors said many of them had received calls threatening them that they would be transferred or that charges would be framed against them. A senior doctor of a medical college hospital in Chennai said many of them were not allowed to mark their attendance on the biometric attendance system and were told to sign in the attendance register alone.

Your luggage can reach before you!

ManthanK.Mehta@timesgroup.com

Mumbai:01.11.2019

Passengers of Tejas express, which will run between Mumbai and Ahmedabad, might get the option of sending their luggage through another mode, instead of lugging it along with them on the train.

Passengers may be charged ₹100 per kg of luggage for the service.

Indian railway catering and transport corporation (IRCTC) is working on a project whereby the luggage will be picked up by a start-up firm a day before the train is to depart.

An IRCTC official said, “The luggage will reach the destination (hotel or residence) of the passenger well before they arrive by train.” The official said, “The main advantage of this is that passengers will have the option of traveling by public transport to catch Tejas express at Borivli or Mumbai central, instead of taking a taxi or car.”

Passengers of Tejas Express can dispatch their luggage a day before the journey and will be charged, ₹100 per kg of luggage, for the service

NEET impersonation: Bail for girl, mother to remain in jail
TIMES NEWS NETWORK

Madurai:01.11.2019

The Madras high court has granted bail to a Dharmapuri-based girl student and denied bail to her mother in connection with the NEET impersonation case.

In their petition, Mynavathi and her daughter said that the case of the prosecution was that the student who appeared for NEET exam in Salem had scored 68 marks while an impersonator who appeared on behalf of her in Kolkata scored 397 marks. The student had joined a private college in Chennai. They said they were arrested based on allegations. The petitioners’ bail petitions filed at Theni principal district and sessions judge on October 23 were dismissed, after which they moved high court Madurai bench seeking bail. When the petition was heard on Thursday, justice G R Swaminathan granted bail to the student without any conditions and denied bail to her mother.

So far, bail has been granted to four students in NEET impersonation case.

Free bus passes remain elusive for school students

TIMES NEWS NETWORK

Chennai:1.11.2019

Six months have passed since schools reopened this academic year, but the state government is yet to issue free bus passes to students. This has put students in a quandary, with there being several instances of them being harassed by ticketchecking squads.

Earlier this year, a video got circulated on social media where a ticket-checking squad was seen demanding fine from school students, who were then asked to get down from a Metropolitan Transport Corporation (MTC) bus at Moolakadai. The students were returning home from school.

A disciplinary action was taken against the staff, sources said. However, such instances have become frequent, according to students, despite transport minister MR Vijayabaskar assuring that students can travel for free in government buses till free bus passes are distributed.

Students from government institutions across Tamil Nadu are exempted from paying tickets while 50% concession is given for those from private institutions.

Government sanctions ₹800 crore every year to state transport corporations, including MTC, towards reimbursement of concession money.

Since the government is planning to do away with paper-made passes and introduce smart cards, there is a delay in distributing them, sources said. Corporations were given the responsibility of verifying details of students and printing bus passes for all eligible candidates.

Till today, the passes are yet to be printed. MTC has issued a circular to all conductors asking them to allow students wearing school uniforms and carrying valid ID cards to travel for free till the passes are ready. Conductors, on the other hand, claim that many miscreants tend to misuse the exemption given to students.

“Many old students simply wear their old uniforms and travel for free. None of them get down at bus stops near schools and only alight near cinema theatres and the beach,” said Prabhu, an MTC conductor on the 102 route (Broadway-Kelambakkam).

Government school students across TN are exempted from tickets while 50% concession is given for those from private schools

Get back to work or lose job: TN to docs
TIMES NEWS NETWORK

Chennai:01.11.2019

The state health department has extended the deadline for doctors to return to work to Friday morning as many doctors, who took part in the strike demanding pay hike, will have to get back to their place of work, health minister C Vijayabaskar said on Thursday. By the end of the day, just 1,613 of the 16,475 doctors abstained from work, the minister said.

“As announced earlier, we will be declaring their posts vacant if they don’t return to work. Their posts will be filled with internal transfers and new recruits. We have a list of doctors who are willing to join service,” Vijayabaskar said. The decision to extend the deadline from 6pm on Thursday to Friday morning was made based on instructions from chief minister Edappadi K Palaniswami, he said. The government has issued transfer orders to more than 50 doctors who have been preventing other government doctors from work. “Most protesters were blocking the way and causing inconvenience to patients. Hospitals can’t be places for protests. We will not allow it anymore,” the health minister said.

Doctors protest at Rajiv Gandhi Government GH on Thursday

CM: Docs can’t hinder people

The Federation of Government Doctors Association – a group of five doctors’ associations – has been on strike since October 25 demanding pay hike, recruitment of more doctors in medical colleges and 50% reservation for service candidates in postgraduate medical education. “The government is fudging attendance records,” said Dr A Ramalingam, convenor, FOGDA. “They managed to threaten some of them to return but a majority are with us. We have at least 60% of the strength with us. Ask them to show the biometric attendance at medical colleges,” he said.

Doctors on strike said it was unfair to call their federation unrecognised. “Two months ago, the minister held talks. He promised to initiate action within six weeks. Now, when we are asking why he did not keep up his words, he says the federation is not a recognised body,” said Dr Balakrishnan, convenor, FOGDA. “He called another Association for talks as he knows they will agree to his decisions,” he said.

Earlier, Palaniswami told the media that government doctors who did not return to work would be replaced. “Doctors are for the people. They cannot cause any inconvenience to the general public. The state spends at least ₹1.24crore on every medical student in government colleges though they pay ₹63,000 as fee hoping they will be in government service,” he said.

The weeklong strike of government doctors in Tamil Nadu continued on Thursday despite the state government’s warning that their posts would be declared as vacant. On Wednesday, 4,683 doctors did not sign the attendance. By noon on Thursday, Vijayabaskar said at least 1,500 striking doctors returned to work.

18,000 Cognizant workers may get pink slip, most from India

Sindhu Hariharan & Shilpa Phadnis TNN

Chennai/Bengaluru:1.11.2019

In the largest layoff exercise ever in the Indian IT sector, Cognizant will part with some 18,000 people in the coming months.

About 6,000 of these will be from the content moderation business that Cognizant does for Facebook. The company, which will exit this business, said it will try to find new homes for the employees involved.

The remaining are mid-tosenior-level employees who the company indicated are not adding much value. While the company did not provide a split, most of the layoffs are likely to be in India, which has more than 70% of Cognizant’s 2.9 lakh employees. Cognizant CEO Brian Humphries, who took over in April and who has been taking major steps to revitalize the company, said they looked at the employee pyramid and found there had been excessive growth in the director plus population in Cognizant in recent years and also in non-billable resources. The Facebook content moderation business has been a thorn in Cognizant’s foot.

TVS Motor & Bajaj Auto end DTSi war

Ten years after TVS Motor and Bajaj Auto sparred over digital twin spark ignition or DTSi technology patent rights, both parties have agreed to ‘amicably settle’ the dispute. While Bajaj claimed ownership for the patent , TVS had said its engine was developed in collaboration with AVL, Austria, and filed a ₹250-crore defamation suit against Bajaj. P15

‘Layoffs in mid/senior levels tough, but necessary to compete with IT players’

The Verge journalist Casey Newton in February investigated the working conditions of the employees in this business and found them severely wanting, and noted that while the median Facebook employee earns $240,000 annually in salary, bonuses, and stock options, a content moderator working for Cognizant in Arizona earns just $28,800 a year.

The work involves determining whether certain content violates client standards and whether they involve objectionable materials. “We’ve determined that this subset of work is not in line with our strategic vision for the company. We recognise cleansing the web is a worthy cause, and one in which companies have a role to play. For this reason, we decided to allocate $5 million to fund research aimed at increasing the level of sophistication of algorithms and automation, thereby reducing users’ exposure to objectionable content,” Cognizant management said in an investor call on Thursday.

Humphries said the company can work with its platform partners to review how it could potentially transfer the employees to a new home “once we complete our contractual obligations to our vendors.”

Cognizant started to simplify its structure at the top and mid-level earlier this year, with cumulative savings from actions taken in previous quarters of the fiscal resulting in annualised savings of over $100 million. The current cost optimisation drive will end by 2020 and result in total charges of approximately $150-200 million in severance and exit costs, and bring annualised gross savings run rate of around $500-550 million in year 2021, the company said.

Phil Fersht, CEO of HfS Research, believes layoffs in the mid/senior levels are tough, but necessary to compete on niche digital projects with mid-cap IT players with lesser mid management weight. “There is an excessive layer of middle management in Cognizant, not unlike several of its competitors, and this impedes the firm’s ability to price competitively in a cut-throat market,” he said.

Cognizant said it continues to recruit and hire talent around the world with a focus on its digital priority areas. It said it plans to hire 5,000 for its digital operations.

The exit from the content moderation business will result in a revenue loss for Cognizant of $240-$270 million on an annualised basis in its communications, media and technology (CMT) segment. Moshe Katri, MD of US-based Wedbush Securities, said the management is targeting adjusted operating margin in 2020 to be in the range of 16%- 17%. “The new CEO’s ambitious `disruptive’ strategic plan effectively makes 2020 an investment year (sales, infrastructure, skill sets, acquisitions), which will likely also showcase a much more competitive Cognizant in the large deal space,” he said.