Job losses and salary cuts hit property companies in India

Property firms in India as considering job losses and some are facing salary cuts of up to 50% as they struggle to cope with the global credit downturn.

One of the biggest developers, Unitech, said it has scaled down about 10% of its 1,700 workforce, mostly trainees.

Delhi-based Ansal Properties and Infrastructure has similarly sacked 70 to 80 employees of its total 1,000 staff, the company's HR head Vivek Gandhi said. Those who were asked to go were either part of the projects which didn't take off or became redundant.

Omaxe chairman Rohtas Goel said he had taken a salary cut of 50%. He also confirmed that his company had cut its workforce by 5%, 70 jobs lost and reduced salaries for its staff by an average 10%.

'The salaries of all employees except those who earn Rs 10,000 or less a month has been reduced,' Goel said.

Similarly, Parsvnath Developers has cut the salary of its senior executives by 25 to 30%. Parsvnath chairman Pradeep Jain said salaries have been 'restructured' for senior employees. He denies reports that his company had sacked staff, but one senior executive said 'at least a few people' have been given marching orders, as Parsvnath tries to service its huge debt.

Another Delhi-based real estate firm, Emaar MGF, said the company has been trying to bring down manpower costs. 'We have not been filling vacancies created by those who left on their own in the past few months. Also, employees' contracts which came up for renewal in the past few months have not been renewed,' Emaar MGF MD Shravan Gupta said.

It is not clear what is happening at property giant DLF. Chairman KP Singh had admitted that the company had sacked some employees, but later retracted what he said.