Giving Delhi a miss: Frequent flyers defer or cancel meetings

Travel to Delhi is one of the biggest worries for most people these days, given the deteriorating air quality in the city. The corporate sector in the city, which accounts for a lot of travel to and from the national capital, is ensuring it goes about business as usual, with all the necessary precautions, of course.
Rajesh Sahay, Senior VP, HR, Wipro Consumer care and Lighting, says that the company is ensuring everyone is made aware of the problem at hand. “Those visiting Delhi are given a one page health advisory and are provided with masks that they need to use mandatorily while in the city,” he says.
For

Shreyans

Jain, the co-founder of Under 25, his recent trip to Delhi was inevitable. “I went about 10 days ago, when the pollution was bad, but flight schedules were still in order. I had to make this trip only because I had to check out a venue, which would not have been effective over video conferencing. But I did cut short my trip and returned to Bengaluru on the same day. Normally, when we head out for meetings to other cities, we don’t book our return tickets, as you tend to meet new people at these meetings and take these encounters further for business development. With Delhi, though, I could not do that,” he says.
Some other companies are ensuring that their employees are kept away from trips to Delhi altogether. “I was supposed to go to Delhi for a conference, but the company has now asked all hotel and flight bookings to be cancelled and recommended not to travel to Delhi for the foreseeable future,” says an employee of

Mindtree

.
Sameer Panchangam, who works for an accounting major, adds, “All meetings scheduled in Delhi have been deferred or moved to video conferencing as flight schedules to and from Delhi are a big mess and there is no commitment from any of the service providers.” Communication expert at a marketing firm, Harsh Sharma adds, “We prefer digital platform for the meetings, hence no work trips for face-to-face meetings are happening now.”

— Inputs from Joyeeta.Chakravorty@timesgroup.com

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