When office banter at the water cooler is history…

It’s the turn of the large conglomerates to bite the bullet. If technology and new economy firms took the lead so far in shielding their employees from coronavirus, now the traditional big groups including the Tatas, and Reliance are taking unusual measures to cope with the growing health hazard. Speaking in one voice, corporate India is asking its people to reduce travel, limit meetings and adopt stringent hygiene standards. Some of them are allowing work from home and advising self-isolation in what looks like a new normal.

Manufacturing plants have not caught up with work from home yet. Unlike the services sector, people in manufacturing do not need to travel extensively outside the premises and this offers a natural immunity, especially if it is also linked to a township.

That apart, other steps are being taken proactively by business majors with deep presence in manufacturing. For instance, every person stepping into the Reliance premises is being thermally screened. “We have asked anyone with symptoms of flu etc to isolate themselves. Fortunately, in the last one month there has not been much of international travel and we did not need to quarantine any of our executives,” said a Reliance spokesman.

Reliance has formed a special group to monitor the situation and brief the chairman and the executive directors every day. Meetings that require more than 20 people in one room are avoided. Carmaker Maruti Suzuki has told employees to use teleconferencing and video conferencing instead. At Tata Sons, at least two employees have selfquarantined and are working from home as they have just returned from coronavirusaffected countries.