The Government of India recently announced that it has extended the relaxation of VPN norms till the end of July enabling employees in the IT sector to continue working from home as the nation fights the coronavirus pandemic.
The recent decision was communicated by the Union Minister for Information Technology and Telecommunication Ravi Shankar Prasad in a meeting with IT ministers from all the states in India.
Earlier organizations were not allowed to connect the office VPN to a home network but later it was allowed as a part of exemptions granted to companies. The relaxation is now further extended till July 31.
Other exemptions given by the government includes the requirement of security deposit and an agreement for WFH facility for IT and IT-enabled services.
OSP license is necessary for companies to enable thousands of employees to WFH. However, the conditions to apply the license were challenging and the IT industry has requested DoT to relax the norms, which it did on March 15, 2020 for 1.5 months.
The company applying for a license should pay a bank guarantee of Rs 1 crore per office. If the company has 76 offices, it should pay Rs 76 crore as bank guarantee. In addition, access to the network will be given only through a virtual private network (VPN) provided by the telecom service providers (TSPs).
Whether employees are allowed to work from home or when they will be asked to return to the office will be at the discretion of the company.
The minister also announced that in view of the change in the working conditions after the lockdown, the government would take steps to strengthen Bharat Net to provide better internet facilities.
“Not just the IT sector, all states should give importance to developing startups and research. The focus will be on providing effective E-governance and E-passes. The working of almost all sectors after Covid-19 has changed. Nearly 80% of professionals are working from home. Almost all the work is done online. To help this, internet services will be strengthened through Bharat Net,” said Prasad.
“I took on board the suggestion that we must have a strategic group assisting our system, state governments, (their) IT Ministers, and some of the best minds of the IT profession… so that with this type of challenge and opportunity, we can leverage fresh ideas. I have also relaxed norms for working from home, it was to end on April 30, I have extended it to July 31. More and more products for Aarogya Setu app, e-pass, linkage with the district officials, all I have agreed to immediately,” he added.
Earlier this week, Ravi Shankar Prasad said that work from home will become the norm now.
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