Digital far-left propagandist website The Quint has asked 45 employees to go on indefinite leave without pay in the wake of the Wuhan Coronavirus pandemic. The list of employees sent on indefinite leave by the propagandists at The Quint includes reporters, copy editors, a bureau chief, production staff and the entire technology team. The team was informed through an email on Monday, which has been accessed by OpIndia, that with effect from the 15th of April, the employees have been sent on ‘furlough’ for an indefinite period.
The email says, “Over the next few weeks whether India will fare poorly in the face of COVID-19, or miraculously survive, no one can say right now. Second, the scale of shutdown and lockdown that #CoronaPandemic has prompted, puts us all in the eye of an economic storm. That is the unprecedented double whammy. We’ve never seen a world where consumer spending is down by over 50%, where wealth and asset values built over years, have been ravaged in a matter of days. We simply have no idea where this could end.”
“In these circumstances, it is clear that our revenues will be under severe strain over the next 3-4 months, at least. During this time, The Quint’s primary objectives should be – a. For everybody to stay healthy. b. For our young operation to survive this period and live to fight another day. That can happen if we take emergency actions, measures only used in the ‘rarest of rare’ situations, measures that may constrain us all, but may also help us stay afloat at a time like this,” the email adds.
The Quint claimed that it was not happy to have made the decision to send their employees on indefinite leave without pay and remained immensely grateful to the indebted employees. Apart from The Quint, layoffs and furloughs are also being reported from other news organizations as they suffer a cash crunch due to the economic crisis unleashed by the Wuhan Coronavirus pandemic. A lot of people have lost their jobs due to the unprecedented crisis and more are expected to lose as the crisis unfolds further.
