According to Reuters<\/a>, the factory\u2019s contractual partners did not maintain accurate salary and attendance records and failed to compensate workers for overtime. The audit also found that a glitch in an attendance machine kept workers from receiving their full wages. Reuters notes that the workers brought up their concerns with the management but no concrete action was taken. <\/p>\n\n\n\nThe Edict contacted Ashish Dhawan, founder of Ashoka University, who acquired a 1.1% stake in Quess Corp during the first national lockdown earlier last year. While he does not comment on labour violations by Quess at the Apple factory, he notes that \u201cthere is neither a question of influence nor conflict of interest\u201d in relation to his investment. He adds that he is an \u201cordinary investor and holding no formal position in Quess.\u201d Responding to whether he can use his position to amplify the workers\u2019 concerns at Ashoka, he says that \u201cDecisions about the day-to-day activities of Ashoka are taken by the ProVC (Admin) [sic]<\/em> If requested by the administration, I and the other Trustees of Ashoka provide assistance on matters including strategy, governance, financial sustainability, fundraising and other matters.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\nQuess told thirty-five members of the contractual staff at Ashoka that they will be transferred to different cities with short notice periods and no option to refuse. In light of Ashoka administration\u2019s lack of response concerning workers\u2019 issues, the student body organised a protest at the atrium on 9th November and put forth immediate demands. These include transparency from the VC and the withdrawal of a worker\u2019s transfer. The long term demands are to revise worker contracts, establish a functional redressal system and ensure all workers at Ashoka be hired directly, as opposed to using third-party contractors. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
by Newsdesk Staff Quess Corp, Ashoka University\u2019s contractual partner in the employment of the housekeeping staff, came under fire last December when disgruntled contractual workers at an Apple factory in Bangalore went on a violent strike. An official labour audit found that Quess, along with two other workforce providers, violated a number of labour laws…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[489],"tags":[169,268],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/edictarchive.the-edict.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5315"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/edictarchive.the-edict.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/edictarchive.the-edict.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/edictarchive.the-edict.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/edictarchive.the-edict.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5315"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"http:\/\/edictarchive.the-edict.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5315\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5319,"href":"http:\/\/edictarchive.the-edict.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5315\/revisions\/5319"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/edictarchive.the-edict.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5315"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/edictarchive.the-edict.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5315"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/edictarchive.the-edict.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5315"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}