Last week, Bimal Dayal, CEO, Indus Towers, one of India’s largest telecom tower companies, boarded the Rapid Metro at Sector 55-56 station in Gurugram and travelled to the Vodafone Belvedere Tower station, the nearest to his office.

Dayal was trying to set an example to his colleagues to use public transport systems instead of private transport to reduce carbon footprint.

Gurugram’s increasing air pollution and traffic woes led Indus Towers to take this step. Says Shankar Iyer, Chief Sales and Marketing officer, Indus Towers, “Pollution is a major contributing factor towards environmental degradation and thus promoting usage of public transport has become the need of the hour.” For Indus Towers, the focus on a green commute fits in with its larger objectives of making its operations sustainable and environment-friendly. Fifty-four per cent of its telecom towers in India do not consume diesel.

According to Iyer, the corporate office in Gurugram has been observing car-free day on Tuesdays. All employees have to travel by public transport or car-pool. In its Punjab and Haryana operations, Indus has taken green commutes a step further by encouraging employees to cycle to work. “This began in 2013 and has continued since. Fifty per cent of our employees there cycle to work,” says Iyer.

Bengaluru-based Unisys India, an information technology company, has been using electric cars to provide transportation to employees. “These electric vehicles run on lithium-ion batteries and do not require fossil fuels to run. With these eco-friendly cars, we have reduced approximately 1,200 tonnes of carbon footprint in 2017 and have clocked 400,000 green km per month, says Ajit Pillai, Director, Facilities, Unisys India.

Indus Towers and Unisys are but two examples of companies trying to get their employees to take a greener route to work. With traffic in cities such as Bengaluru, Hyderabad, Mumbai and Delhi hitting unmanageable levels, employers have had no choice but to start thinking of some ways to cut commute time, improve productivity as well as well-being of their staff.

It’s certainly time for strong action. A recent report by Boston Consulting Group commissioned by ridesharing app Uber said that India wastes ₹1.44 lakh crore due to traffic congestion in the four major cities. On average, road congestion in peak hours in Indian cities stood at 149 per cent – far higher than Bangkok, Manila and Singapore where it stood at 88.5 per cent. During peak hours, Indian commuters take 1.5 times longer to travel a distance compared to non-peak hours.

Many offices in Gurugram, Mumbai and Bangalore have already introduced staggered work timings to beat the peak hour phenomenon. Take Otis India, which has flexi-hours for its staff to help them beat the 9-5 peak time. “Our core hours are between 10 am and 4 pm,. The before and after hours are flexible,” says Sebi Joseph, President, Otis India. In addition, non-field employees have the option of work from home, two days a month. “Both the above policies have been adopted with multiple objectives in mind. It helps ease the load on our busy city roads. Additionally, it helps employees feel a little bit at ease as it gives them flexibility to navigate their lives a little more smoothly,” says Joseph.

Companies that have multiple offices in a city – TCS, Unisys, PwC, for example – tell their employees to work out of the one closest to their home.

Several companies – Cognizant, for one – also encourage their staff to use third party car pool apps like QuickRide and SRide and have leader boards in office to help employees match destinations with each other. At Unisys, says Pillai, employees can identify opportunities for car-pooling using the internal social media platform Yammer. Apart from cutting costs of getting to work, reducing traffic on the road, “an added benefit of car-pooling is that employees get to network with one another,” he says.

Unisys has also launched a GPS tracking application – Drive app – that live tracks the office shuttles and cabs. “This application enhances the travel experience, safety and improves on-time arrival (OTA) / on-time departure (OTD),” says Pillai. “A panic button with an SOS option is available to assist employees in case of any emergency,” he says.

While it is encouraging to see Indian companies come up with solutions to ease congestion in the cities, employers in several European countries have taken such initiatives to the next level. Many gift employees bicycles and electric scooters and provide a bike allowance. Those who cycle to work get rewards and recognition. Perhaps in India too we could have green bonuses for smart commuters.

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