500 complaints against BYJUs in Ranchi

LAGATAR24 NETWORK

Ranchi, Nov 3: One of the several companies that have, since its advent, emerged quite rapidly in the education industry is BYJU’s. The advent of Covid, helped BYJU’s promote its online tuition and online study material idea, and in some cases was even able to help students with difficult topics.

However, after Covid, while several companies were able to cut losses, the company seems to be running at a loss. The company has thus ‘cut’ employees to make up for the loss in order to keep running afloat, along with taking a loan from the company that it bought earlier for nearly 1 billion.

Notably, when Byju Raveendran started the company in 2011, he had not expected to have such success in this short a time. Be it Shahrukh in the appeasing advertisements or the ease with which difficult topics were explained, the company was successful. After Covid, however, the company broke all records as the number of children joining the application increased.

BYJU’s soon acquired Aakash Educational Services for a cash and stock deal of almost $950 million in April 2021. However, earlier in the week, its parent organisation Think & Learn took out a loan from Aakash for Rs 300 cr.

Now, it is sourced from all over claiming that employees are being removed forcefully. The company now also seems to be facing legal troubles with over 500 complaints registered against it only in Ranchi.

Officials at its Lalpur branch have stated, “Around 350 employees worked here, but almost 318 were terminated from the company one by one. Now only 12 remain.”

A former employee who was fired by the company, while talking to a Lagatar correspondent said that the employees are being fired for the past three months. Some received one-month salaries, while others were not even given that before they were fired.

He further claimed that even when working days are five per week, employees often end up working seven days a week due to the work pressure.

Meanwhile, parents of children with BYJU’s subscriptions have claimed, “The promises made before admissions are not fulfilled. It is said that live classes will be taken, round-the-clock help will be provided, PTMs (Parents-Teachers meetings) will be conducted every month and students’ progress reports will be provided. However, nothing as such has happened.”

News reports by India TV, on the other hand, suggest BYJU’s purchased an institute named ‘Topper’ for $150 million and retained 80 per cent of its staff. However, later, the company fired all its employees apart from its marketing and sales personnel.

As per another report by the news organisation, BYJU’s forced around 170 employees to resign. This was also confirmed when the employees met Kerala Labor Planning Minister V Shivankutty and expressed concerns.

Meanwhile, the company denied the allegations and stated that it is a responsible company that follows the law and has almost 50,000 employees.

Amid this, another employee on social media claimed that his colleague in the company that had been trying for a leave for the past 22 days passed of a heart attack.

Meanwhile, as per information from Money Control, BYJU’s suffered in the past six months and lost 4,589 cr in 2021-22, which is 20 times its loss in 2019-20. The company also filed its yearly report after a one-year delay in 2021. Last month, the company raised $250 million for the first time at a flat valuation of $22 billion.

On the other hand, a BYJUs spokesperson has said, “Your reporter mentioned that the content of the headline is based on a hearsay from a former employee of BYJU’s. We request you not to fall prey to baseless allegation, not backed by evidence and proof.”