Wipro Fires 300 Employees For Moonlighting: Here's How Companies Catch Such Acts

The recent debate around moonlighting, in the IT sector, has raised several questions about the practice. 

The discussion was fuelled when IT major Wipro fired around 300 of its employees for moonlighting. Wipro chairman Rishad Premji had said at an event that the company had discovered 300 of its employees who were working directly for one of Wipro's competitors. He had further said that the services of those employees had been terminated.

Now, following Wipro's action that has come as a shock to many tech professionals, let us look at how the firm could have caught its moonlighting employees.

According to C Sunil, CEO of Team Lease Digital, employees having dual employment can be caught through their PF account. He added that if an employee uses the same IT tool for both jobs then the company can find out about it through HR intelligence, reported The Hindu BusinessLine.

While highlighting that techies must have remained cautious before taking up a second job, Mr Sunil added that employers can seek help from banks to get information on the employee's bank account and discover about moonlighting.

Moonlighting is the practice where an individual takes up a secondary job while being on the payroll of a company. Here the “moon” reference is used because most people do their primary job in the daytime and take the secondary work at night.

While sacking its employees, Rishad Premji had said that playing in a band over the weekend is different from secretly working for rivals. The chairman described moonlighting as “cheating, plain and simple” and said that he was not deterred by hate mails he has been receiving over his tweet. Wipro, in its latest statement, said that “certain employees found to be operating in circumstances that are in direct conflict with Wipro's interests have been terminated.”