Aryans Infoways, Technopark – A Cheating Story

Early last year a relatively unknown company in Technopark called Aryans Infoways went on a gigantic recruitment spree recruiting students from as far away as Chennai and Bangalore, not to mention the local ones in Kerala. There were regular interviews and job placement ads in most job sites. Some reputed Engineering in post graduate colleges even proudly went on to declare in their placement lists that a good number of their students had been selected by this company. These recruitments have been going on for over three years.

Aryans Infoway had earlier earned notoriety on several occasions on blogs, public forums and chat sites. But suddenly these posts disappeared or were edited. It seems this information on the net was removed when the management complained that the reports were generating negative publicity for those who were already proper employees of the firm. The publicity would ruin the company and its employees, was the complaint.

On one site related to embedded technology there were loads of questions on what was going on at Aryans Infoways. There were scores of questions but nobody had any answers. These were queries from mostly students outside Kerala, in Chennai and North India.

No one knows why the heat was put off Arayans Infoways, but one person who is the administrator of a public forum said he decided to do away with all posts on the company off his site because the language was becoming too ungentlemanly and that he was being plagued by phone calls day and night from prospective candidates wanting to know more about this company.

The company asked for a deposit of 1 lac – 1.5 lac rupees from each candidate as well as a three year bond. A stipend of 5000/- rupees was supposed to be paid per month and after probation it was too be increased to 10,000/-. Anybody living in a city knows that 5000 or even 1000 INR is hardly enough to make ends meet. Students were under the impression that the training was supposed to be taken at Technopark. However training was given at one of their branches in Thambanoor in the city.

However a lot of students promised by a lucrative future in the software industry made the plunge and joined the company after paying the deposit. Little did they know what lay in store for them.

Even the amount of 5000 INR was not paid in full and if paid, was not done on a regular basis. Students complained that the so-called “training” they were receiving was nothing better than the one they had in their first years at engineering college. So they decided to wait it out patiently marking their attendance at Aryans Infoways and in the meantime attending some other course as trainee or student elsewhere.

The Aryans Infoway office closed for Onam, which is usual as it shuts down for every tom-dick-or-harry reason; but this time never opened again.

Police acted on a complaint from some employees who declared they were cheated. They promised to investigate the complaint and search the Aryans Infoway head office at Tehcnopark. That brought down the entire works on top of Aryans Infoway. No one expected this to happen. And when the word went around that the company could be a fraud (through the print and tv media), the trainee employees could not believe their ears.

The two main actors in this drama are a certain Mr Jayachandran and a Mr Harikrishnan. Both are absconding. It remains to be seen how they will deal with the legal complaints made against them, once they are back, if they ever do.

Employees are praying and keeping their fingers crossed expecting to get back the money they have lost in what could possibly be a gigantic fraud.

Please check the followig links for media updates on this topic:

http://www.hindu.com/2008/10/06/stories/2008100657650300.htm

http://in.youtube.com/watch?v=ZIoteVl92bo

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From The Indian Express:

Shyam Subramanyam, CEO of the controversial company at Technopark, Travancore Software Solutions, has approached the District Sessions Court for anticipatory bail. Shyam is an accused in a cheating case filed by the employees of the company.

The court has asked the Kazhakoottom police, which has registered the case following complaints submitted by two engineers, to file a report on the bail petition. It is learnt that the police will submit the report on Wednesday.

Shyam has been accused of accepting sums ranging from Rs 1 lakh – 1.5 lakh from candidates, promising them employment and on-the-job training for IBM mainframe course in the Technopark-based company.

The complainants alleged that they were not given proper training and had been forced to work at the company for a pittance. Many who completed the one-year-bond period were denied the bond money, though the company had promised earlier to return the money after the completion of the bond period.

Meanwhile, mediation talks initiated by Thiruvananthapuram Rural SP Sugathan on Tuesday between the company and the complainants failed midway. The company offered to allow the complainants to continue working there till the end of the bond period for Rs 1,200 a month.

But the complainants weren’t ready to accept the offer. The company refused to pay the security amount to them. ‘‘We were disappointed over the treatment meted out to us at the SP office.

The SP advised us to withdraw from the case, as it’s better for our bright future. He also asked us why only a couple of engineers raise complaints while all others work happily there,’’ a complainant told this website’s newspaper.

source :http://www.newindpress.com/NewsItems.asp?ID=IEO20070925235652