India, July 6 -- Cognizant, an American multinational corporation that provides IT services, is reportedly laying off as many as 18,000 employees, according to state IT employee unions of Karnataka and Chennai. The move has invited the wrath of the IT unions who say that firing employees at such a critical time is "illegal". The Karnataka State IT/ITeS Employees Union has also sent legal notices to the organization as they received over 20 complaints, according to a report on CNBC.

Cognizant, however, has issued a statement saying it is a "performance management" process which is normal happening in all IT companies and is not related to the Coronavirus pandemic. "Performance management is a normal process across all companies in the IT ...