'Can't run sweat shops': Karnataka's IT minister weighs in on Narayana Murthy's '70-hour work week' remark 

Karnataka IT minister Priyank Kharge on Tuesday joined the ongoing debate on whether youngsters should work for 70 hours a week, an idea floated by Infosys founder Narayana Murthy. Kharge, son of Congress chief Mallikarjun Kharge, said companies cannot force individuals to work extra hours and "cannot run sweat shops".

The minister appreciated Murthy's contribution to the IT industry and his 'wisdom' but said instead of counting the number of hours, firms should see how productive the employees are in their assignments.

"To each his own. It's different strokes for different folks," Kharge said while speaking to The Times of India. "As a minister, I would concentrate on productivity. If you are being productive in seven hours, I don't mind. And if you intend to put your other seven hours to ensure that your productivity increases and it helps the department or the ministry, you are welcome to do it. But we cannot force somebody to do this (put in 70 hours). You cannot run sweat shops."

Kharge's response comes a week after Murthy, while speaking to former Infosys Mohandas Pai, said that India's work productivity was among the lowest and that youngsters should work for 70 hours a week (14 hours a day in 5-day week) if they wanted to see the country ahead of other big economies. 

Murthy's suggestion sparked a fierce debate, with some backing the idea while others countering that long hours does not mean more productivity. 

Ola CEO Bhavish Aggarwal and industrialist Sajjan Jindal have endorsed Murthy's statement while CureFit founder Mukesh Bansal and Adobe CEO Shantanu Narayen have disagreed with the idea. 

Bansal in LinkedIn post said companies demanding 70 hours per week also need to create proportional upside. ". You can't demand 70 hours of work at 40 hours salary. That's not fair," he said.  

Narayen said people should do what they want without taking the victim mentality – "that I am being told what to do. You are more in control of your career, your destiny, than you give yourself credit. At the same time, you only have yourself to blame if you don’t like what you do."

RPG Enterprises Chairman Harsh Goenka recently said, "It's no longer about working 50 or 70 hours, but about your own ambition, your purpose, and your productivity." Marico founder Harsh Mariwala said it was not about the hours clocked in, it was about the quality and passion one