Terror puts brake on Mumbai cos

Hardly 14 hours have passed since Mumbai have come under siege of terror. Taj Mahal and Trident Hotels, Chhatrapati Shivaji Terminus (CST), Colaba and other locations in south Mumbai are virtually terror-stricken in the attack that claimed 78 lives and injuring hundred of people.

As the hubs of activities in the city are still under the gun-wielding terrorists, the impact of these heinous crimes against humanity is evidently being reflected in the city's business affairs and the IT sector is no exception.

As a reflection of the terror siege, many IT companies have closed their shutters for the day and some have reportedly asked their employees to work from home.

Netcore Slutions Pvt Ltd, an IT product and service company based in Mumbai, decided to down the shutter for the day considering the situation in the city.

"Whatever has happened is unfortunate. And we have decided not to work today considering the security of the employees," said Abhijit Saxena, CEO, Netcore.

However, he hoped that things would normalize soon and people would be back to work. "After all, terror attack is not something exclusive to India and hence I don't think it would have any major impact on the industry or the economic scenario of the country as such," said Saxena.

TCS House near CST, the main office of Tata Consultancy Services in Mumbai has also downed the shutters today considering the extremely panicking situation. However, the TCS offices in north Mumbai are working.

"TCS employees that work out of our offices in South Mumbai can operate out of any of the offices in North Mumbai until further advise," Pradipta Bagchi, senior general manager, Corporate Communications, TCS said a in a statement.

"A team of TCS experts continue to monitor the situation continuously and the company has very well established business continuity plans in place should the need arise to implement them," he added.

Meanwhile, Maharashtra Government has declared a general holiday for today. The terror strike has also resulted in the cancellation of many IT events in the city. Sun Microsystems, which had planned to announce its new initiative targeted at emerging markets sales region in India, has been called off the event for the time being.

Another such event of Sony Ericsson slated for today, which was set at ITC Grand Central in Parel, Mumbai's central suburb has also been cancelled.

It appears that the IT businesses are under the 'wait and watch' mood till the tense situation in the financial capital improves and the business is back to normalcy.

Source: CMN