California Accuses Cisco of Job Discrimination Based on Indian Employee’s Caste
FILE PHOTO: The Cisco emblem is observed at their sales space on the Cell Global Congress in Barcelona, Spain, February 26, 2018. REUTERS/Sergio Perez/Report Photograph
At Cisco, the unnamed worker reported his supervisor to human sources in November 2016 for trip his caste to colleagues.
- Reuters OAKLAND
- Closing Up to date: July 1, 2020, 7:22 AM IST
California regulators sued Cisco Techniques Inc on Tuesday, accusing it of discriminating in opposition to an Indian-American worker and permitting him to be confused via two managers as a result of he was once from a decrease Indian caste than them.
US employment regulation does now not particularly bar caste-based discrimination, however California’s Division of Truthful Employment and Housing contends within the lawsuit that India’s lingering caste gadget is in line with secure categories comparable to faith.
The lawsuit, filed in federal courtroom in San Jose, does now not identify the alleged sufferer. It states he has been a primary engineer at Cisco’s San Jose headquarters since October 2015 and that he was once raised on the backside of India’s caste hierarchy as a Dalit, as soon as known as “untouchables.”
That caste hierarchy was once enforced within the administrative center, in keeping with the lawsuit, which accuses the 2 former engineering managers of harassment.
Cisco stated it didn’t have speedy remark, pronouncing that it deliberate to factor a remark at a later time.
Like different huge Silicon Valley employers, Cisco’s team of workers comprises hundreds of Indian immigrants, maximum of whom had been introduced up as Brahmins or different prime castes.
The civil rights staff Equality Labs in a 2018 file cited within the lawsuit discovered that 67% of Dalits surveyed felt handled unfairly at their US places of work.
Some employers have begun taking motion. Massachusetts-based Brandeis College final yr added caste to its nondiscrimination coverage in what is assumed to be a landmark transfer in US upper training.
At Cisco, the unnamed worker reported his supervisor to human sources in November 2016 for trip his caste to colleagues. The executive allegedly retaliated, however Cisco decided caste discrimination was once now not unlawful and problems endured thru 2018, the lawsuit states.
Cisco reassigned the worker’s tasks and remoted him from colleagues, rejected a carry and alternatives that may have led to at least one and denied him two promotions, in keeping with the lawsuit.
