White Collar Chronicles - Episode 1
The story of how an IT employee cycled 300 km to survive
A 25 year old man Rajiv Sikdar reaches Kolkata to pursue his dreams in Information Technology. Rajiv is from a remote village called Pavra near Santhali Police Station in Purulia district, West Bengal.
Rajiv Sikdar, who is from a farming family, started working in a company called Fusion in Sector 5, Salt Lake, West Bengal. Just the moment when his dreams were ready to take off, Covid-19 broke out in the country and everything changed.
With the declaration of lockdown around the country, the company management decided to go for mass retrenchment ignoring the advisory of the government labour office .
Some of his colleagues got sacked whereas he somehow survived the job cuts. He could not reach office from 23rd march till 2nd May due to the lack of any private or government transport. Company authorities too didn’t provide any transport or help him to avail work from home facilities.
Rajiv tried surviving on his small savings and waited for the lockdown to be called off. Alas! The lockdown got extended even further. On 3rd May, when all his savings were over he called his office authorities to ask for his salary, but company management refused any pay. They cited a no work no money policy directly ignoring the 2005 Epidemic Act in India.
Rajiv, who was staying in a rented apartment was constantly getting eviction threats from his home owner. With almost no support and financially cornered in every way in the City of Joy, Rajiv did the unexpected.
He borrowed some money from his local friends, rented a cycle and decided to ride back to his home from Kolkata to Purulia with all his luggage. With almost no food, no transport, and no proper place to rest, he cycled 310km in 3 days until he was stopped by some local police authorities. Instead of being compassionate towards this young man with shattered dreams, the state authorities charged him for breaking Covid-19 lockdown norms.
In spite of everything, the young man didn’t give up. He decided to stand up for his rights. He contacted the All India IT and ITeS Employees’ Union and decided to fight all atrocities against him and his colleagues.
