Freedom of Association

ITC's culture is characterised by collaborative relationships and high employee engagement that relies on building partnerships and interdependence. Adhering to these principles has helped build, sustain and strengthen employee engagement in the organisation.

Policy: ITC respects the employees' right to organise themselves into interest groups, independent from supervision by the management. In keeping with the spirit of this policy, employees are not discriminated against for exercising this right.

Implementation: The policy is communicated to all employees through induction programmes, policy manuals and intranet portals. The custodian of this policy is the HR Head of each operational unit who reports directly to the Unit Head on such issues. The employees are informed of these rights by the unions who solicit their support to represent them formally before the management.

Monitoring & Audit: Each ITC Unit has appropriate systems to ensure compliance with the Policy and statutory provisions, including means for filing of grievances, collective bargaining agreements and minutes of worker meetings. The HR department of the concerned unit submits annual reports to the functional head in cases of identified incidents of violation of freedom of association and collective bargaining. Divisional and Corporate HR regularly monitor compliance with the Policy. Corporate HR compiles these on a half-yearly basis and reports to the Corporate Management Committee.

Compliance during 2005-06: For unionised employees, compliance is ensured through a robust grievance handling procedure and the presence of a union that brings violations to the notice of the unit HR Head. During 2005-06 no incident of violation of freedom of association was reported either to the concerned units or statutory authorities. Within ITC's operations, there is no area where the right to exercise freedom of association and collective bargaining is at risk.