TCS’s plan to axe 12,000 jobs isn’t just another corporate shake-up—it’s a brutal reality check. In an Economic Times column, Value Research CEO Dhirendra Kumar calls it a “wake-up call” for every Indian clinging to the myth of tech-sector job security.
India’s largest IT firm, long seen as a symbol of steady employment, is cutting 2% of its workforce—mostly middle managers. But Kumar says the public outrage misses the real story. “For decades, the technology sector operated like a government job. That illusion has now shattered,” he writes.
Kumar doesn’t mince words: employment instability isn’t a bug in the system—it’s the system. “If a company like TCS fails to adapt to a changing world, it’ll be dead sooner rather than later.” Layoffs, he argues, are not corporate cruelty but the price of staying competitive.
He warns that many Indian workers are dangerously exposed—not just because they’ve over-relied on their jobs, but because they’ve built lives with no financial cushion. “The biggest vulnerability middle-class families face isn’t low income—it’s massive fixed costs,” he writes. High EMIs, credit card debt, and lifestyle creep turn any job loss into a full-blown crisis.
Kumar recounts the story of a tech couple whose careers and portfolios were tightly tethered to the same sector. When the downturn hit, they lost both. “They weren’t just under-diversified financially—they’d failed to diversify their lives,” he notes.
The solution, Kumar says, isn’t denial or outrage—it’s financial armor: emergency funds, modest debt, flexible spending. “If you spend 90% of your income, a layoff is disaster. At 60%, it’s inconvenience,” he warns.
TCS’s move isn’t the end. It’s the opening act. “Rather than raging against market realities, build buffers to survive them,” Kumar writes. Because in today’s economy, assuming your job is safe is the riskiest move of all.
