Employee verification must in K'taka: Police

Bangalore, Apr 18: The Nadeem Kashmiri-HSBC case and the recent arrest of Mumbai train blast accused Mohammed Mujamil Sheikh, an Oracle employee, have resulted in the police insisting on pre-employment verification for new recruits from outside Karnataka.

The police have asked corporates and private organisations after several meetings with them. However, their response has been lukewarm.

HSBC employee Nadeem Kashmiri was arrested after he allegedly leaked customer data to a person in the UK.

The police held meetings with the companies in the IT and IT-enabled Services sectors and asked them to check candidate antecedents before recruitment because Nadeem had obtained forged education certificates.

"We requested many companies to at least crosscheck education certificates. However, not many companies have come forward," joint commissioner of police (crime) Gopal B Hosur told The Times of India.

The problem came into focus once again when the Mumbai police came to the city to nab Mohammed Mujamil Sheikh of Oracle for his alleged involvement in the train blasts.

The city police sent teams to Hyderabad to crack the case of forged certificates. They returned with three men who got these certificates for Mujamil. But companies don't seem too keen on verification.

The verification fee hike, from Rs 150 to Rs 6,000, could be a reason. The police said either the companies could do their own verification or seek police help.

"Only a few companies demand verification from candidates. Once it's done, they don't keep us informed," Hosur stressed.

The companies say it is imperative for them to carry out such verifications in the background of scandals and terrorist threat.

Says a senior executive of a global financial services firm, whose backend operations are in Bangalore: "We scrutinise the candidates' resumes but do not issue appointment orders till all checks are complete. Infiltration by terrorists and persons with anti-social and criminal antecedents have forced us to take such measures."

Among different checks are previous employment, verification of documents, financial credibility and police records.

S Hem Kumar, Novell Software, senior manager (facilities), says "Hiring the right talent and right resource is important for the company prospects. Certain ugly incidents indicate that verification is a must and this is now becoming routine."

Managements are also wary on another count - techies have access to a lot of sensitive company information and often sent on projects worldwide. In the wrong hands, this could prove extremely costly.

OneIndia News