Kritika 
shaadi.com wfh policy sparks hybrid work debate in india
A Single Tweet That Moved the Needle
Anupam Mittal, founder and CEO of People Group and Shaadi.com, probably did not anticipate a national debate in a single day when he announced that his 500-plus employees would have to work remotely during the day. However, the Shaadi.com latest news was soon picked up from the business pages and straight into the heart of a debate raging among Indians about how the hybrid model of work has already begun and how it should work.
The trigger? The Prime Minister’s demand that Indians reduce their use of fuel, call off gold imports and avoid foreign trips to combat foreign exchange shortage in the wake of the Middle East crisis and the strain on India’s import bill, to citizens and businesses of India.
Why the One-Day WFH Policy Matters Right Now
At face value, it seems as if Shaadi.com is just making a minor change in its operations when they allow their employees to work remotely for one day. One Wednesday every week, staff are on leave. However, the move is no less than a game-changer in India’s rapidly changing policy landscape on attendance at the workplace.
India is at a corner. In 2020, various companies, including multinational, Indian conglomerates, and tech startups, tried hybrid working arrangements, but the changeover to workplaces became more prominent in the past two years. Collaboration, culture and productivity have been the reasons that many employers instituted four or five-day in-office schedules. In this context, even one FTH day can be a statement.
However, the Shaadi.com WFH policy was indeed unique in the sense that it’s not a benefit for the employee; rather, it’s a responsibility of the nation — something that may resonate better with the boards and investors than the flexibility versus productivity argument.
The Numbers Behind the Decision
Mittal’s “back of the envelope” calculation was very persuasive to many. The company says it will save about 30,000 litres of petrol a year from the decreased commuting of 500 of its employees. The number of the nation’s tens of millions of white-collar workers makes for eye-catching arithmetic.
Almost 50 per cent of the crude oil, nearly 60 per cent of LNG and almost 100 per cent of LPG imports pass through the Strait of Hormuz. A rise in energy prices anywhere in the world increases India’s trade deficit and pressures the rupee, which is already at near all-time lows against the dollar. Such a scenario makes flexible work policy India’s corporates opt for, macroeconomically significant.
Reactions: Applause, Scepticism, and a Fair Share of Irony
As expected, there was a mixed response on social media towards the news of Shaadi.com Mittal’s quick response to the PM’s call was commended by many users. One of the comments made by the commenter said that if more companies follow this trend, India can save millions of litres of fuel each year, and also cut down on heavy traffic in the urban areas. Others cited the environmental co-benefits, claiming that less commuting would alleviate urban congestion and decrease the amount of emissions produced by transportation.
But the critics had not gone away. One user noted that it was strange that an experienced entrepreneur like you didn’t think about it after years of evidence, after COVID, that WFH has not been the business priority for the tech sector in India after offices were reopened. Some wondered if going through the day one day a week was really significant or symbolic.
The symbolic or structural debate is at the core of the further hybrid work debate that India has been having since 2022.
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What This Means for Indian Corporate Work Culture
The one-day work-from-home policy that Mittal has implemented is ‘a modest one’ by international standards. The baseline is 2 or 3 remote days per week, offered by many of the Western tech companies. However, Indian corporate work culture has been more aligned towards being physically present at the workplace to signify commitment, and any formal recognition of a WFH day will be a positive change in norm setting.
It also shows how external pressure (in this case, an energy crisis and a prime ministerial call) can achieve what internal HR advocacy can do. But flexible work policy India’s companies implement in response to national priorities could last longer than policies that are implemented just to attract and retain talent, as it is accompanied by social legitimacy, and political reversals would be uncomfortable.
The Road Ahead for Hybrid Work in India
This is probably not the final such announcement of the Shaadi.com WFH policy. With fuel costs constantly fluctuating and the government showing itself worried about India’s import dependency, more CEOs might be tempted to use the patriotism argument for hybrid work to provide flexibility for their employees, even as they deceive opponents of work-from-home’s preferred flex options.
The decision by one-day WFH per week to become a minimum or maximum for Indian tech workplaces will depend on the responses of other big companies in the coming weeks. Of late, though, Mittal’s experiment on Wednesday has made WFH news in India a facet to be discussed in the boardroom as well as at the dinner table.
