In an internal circular to the human resources department, Executive Vice-President and Chief Global Delivery Officer Sambuddha Deb said the company was finding employees on the bench assigned different projects were declining to take up assignments, citing various factors, including constraints in changing locations.

�We have gone way past the stage when we can afford to tolerate this. With immediate effect, the company policy is as follows � any person who refuses to take up an assignment would be asked to move out of the organisation immediately,� he said.

The policy, said to be a part of the company�s efforts to contain its rapidly dropping numbers of billable headcount, has created widespread discontent among the staff. So far, employees have the freedom to decide the project they want to work on.