Kerala mulls pubs at IT Parks

Thiruvananthapuram, Nov 3 (IANS) Kerala Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan on Wednesday hinted that his government was not averse to demands or opening pubs at IT Parks in the state.

As soon as Vijayan said that he was not averse to the issue, the first opposition came from veteran Congress leader V.M. Sudheeran.

Making it amply clear that times have changed and there is the need of ramping up of numerous facilities at IT Parks, Vijayan said that they had taken up the issue and were thinking on these lines after demands came from Nasscom and others.

"We were thinking about it and that was the time Covid struck, leaving everything in shambles. Now that things are clearing up, we have got requests from several quarters on the issue of pubs and we will look into this aspect," he said in the Kerala Assembly.

Across the state, there are three major IT Parks at Thiruvananthapuram, Kochi and Kozhikode, which have a combined workforce of around 1.50 lakh.

Lack of entertainment has been pointed out as one the major impediments for many major IT firms to further expand their operations in Kerala, even though the state is considered as one of the best destination in terms of availability of manpower and other facilities, he said.

However, Sudheeran told the media that the thought of opening pubs should not be considered at all.

"At no cost should the Vijayan government go forward with this and for long many they were saying the same about tourism being affected because of lack of such facilities. But the fact of the matter and statistics also prove that tourism has not been affected and this is the same for IT also. We strongly oppose any dilution in rules."

Vijayan's statement was welcomed by a group of IT buffs.

"Times have changed but it does not mean that employees will run into these pubs and have a glass of beer and resume office duties. It's not at all like that, employees are responsible and they know their duties too towards their employers. This is just a facility where after office hours, employees can relax and do not have to go to other places," said the IT buffs.