'Weeklong off on Diwali': Edelweiss Mutual Fund CEO proposes a longer festive break

Edelweiss Mutual Fund MD and CEO Radhika Gupta on Sunday floated an idea for a 'weeklong off' during Diwali instead of one or two days in corporate offices. She said in all her years living in the West, the holiday season was long and extended. Gupta cited the example of Christmas and the Chinese New Year. She said Christmas time off started after the 15th of December and continued through the New Year. "In China, Chinese New Year has a long holiday."

Unfortunately, in India, the business executive said, Diwali holidays are usually 1 or 2 days in corporate offices. "In years like this one, when Diwali falls on a weekend, there is one day off. Many of us travel to be with families across the country, sometimes far and wide," she said.

"While we can take the days off, is there a care for a longer festive break, maybe a week-long one, as a country, so we can enjoy the festive season and family time without counting days?" Gupta said.

The Edelweiss CEO's idea of a longer festive break was well-received by people on social media. "Madam, very valid points," said Prabhu, CEO at Fibocan. Prabhu also shared an incident that happened during his time at an MNC bank based in Hong Kong. He said every year, the bank used to have "Change Freeze" on two occasions, one during Christmas and New Year (normally from December 20th or 21st till January 1st week), the second one for a smaller window of 10 days, during Chinese New Year.

A 'Change Freeze' period refers to a specific time frame during which no changes or updates are allowed to be made to a system, software, or any other critical infrastructure.

Unaware of this 'Change Freeze' period, Prabhu asked his bosses why it was followed. "The obvious answer is due to limited resources available during the holiday periods, as many will avail their Mandatory Block leaves," Prabhu said he suggested why this period can't be extended in the India office two more times, both for 10 days, one during Diwali (Between October to November) and the second one during the Pongal time (January 14th to 18th).

"I got little support from my peers ( other lines of Technology Heads) though they acknowledged that my points are valid. Unfortunately, not enough people supporting it, it did not materialise," he wrote in a detailed post on X, formerly Twitter.

Vivek Mashrani, founder of Technofunda Investing, said he has already implemented it in his company. "You can start with your organisation, propose it to your board. We have already implemented it in our company."

Noted investor Shankar Sharma, however, disagreed with the idea and said: "India has too many holidays already. We don't want more. What's more relevant is that like in the West, they should make these holidays happen near weekends, to enable long weekends. Here we have them on Tuesday/ Wednesday etc which is a waste."

Vanamali, another social media user, said a longer festive break was "absolutely necessary". But the issue is, he said, that we have many other festivals. "Cumulatively, we consume the same number of holidays as the West when combined with other public holidays. Can corporates make a Diwali fortnight? Absolutely yes! In that case, they will have to claw back some of those other festive holidays. In my view, employees will agree too. Great time to travel, plan vacations, and get that necessary break. We also have the right to say “Happy Holidays” with no specific attribution to any festival."

Also read: 'Need to stop speaking in English': Paytm Money CEO explains the problem with mutual fund industry