Surat : A diamond merchant in Gujarat’s Surat city gifted nearly 500 cars and about 200 flats besides expensive jewellery as Diwali bonus to 1200 of his employees.
The surprise bonus was given to nearly 1200 members of staff, who achieved their annual targets during the year, by their employer Savji Bhai. He gifted 491 cars to employees who did not have a car. About 200 employees who did not have a house got flats from their boss while nearly 525 employees were given gold and diamond jewellery.
The diamond merchant gifted brand new Fiat Punto cars to 491 of its employees and 207 of its employess were given 2-BHK flats apart from expensive jewellery to nearly 600 employees of the company. Surat-based Harikrishna Exports spent approximately Rs 50 crore for these incentives.
“They had cars, flats and gold for the Diwali bonus, the gifts were distributed as per our requirement,” a beaming employee said.
The chairman of Hari-Krishna Exports, Savjibhai Dholakiya said, every Diwali he always try to do something special for his staff. This year the surprise bonus was given to around 1200 members of his export company.
The Diwali gift is part of the Rs. 6000 crore Company’s ‘loyalty programme’. The firm first started this ‘loyalty programme’ three years back. According to reports, in the first year, only three cars were given away while in second year, 72 employees received cars as their gifts for successfully achieving their targets.
The company decided to offer its workers a performance bonus in an attempt to check attrition and meet growing demand for their business from the West. The company introduced the performance-based incentive system in 2010 in which workers can earn 5-35% in incentives based on value-addition. The move helped has bring down attrition level in the company.
The Surat diamond industry cuts and processes 80% of the world’s rough stones and supply them to Belgium. Several Diamond companies in Gujarat started offering a bonus to workers in May-June 2009 to retain them till Diwali, and have continued with the practice since.
