Call centre workers in India are turning to drugs to keep them awake while speaking to British callers.
There is growing evidence of staff smoking cannabis during work hours and abusing over-the-counter medicine to keep them going through their long night shifts.
More than a quarter of call centre workers used drugs, mainly cannabis, compared to just 4.1 per cent of the wider population, according to a study published in the Indian Journal of Sleep Medicine.
Last week, the UN Office on Drugs and Crime visited India's outsourcing capital of Bangalore to warn India's largest call centre companies of the problem and persuade them to cooperate with the first detailed survey on the issue.
Pradeep Kumar, the UN's project coordinator, said it is difficult to convince the major companies running call centres of the urgency of the issue.
'Denial runs pretty deep.' he said. 'And it's not because they don't know of the problem. They are vaguely aware of it, but it's not really a priority.'
He said the UNODC had decided to target Indian call centres after being alerted to the growing problem of drug use by doctors running clinics near the main call centre areas in Bangalore and Gurgaon on outskirts of Delhi.
'It was a matter of anecdotal evidence coming from the GPs, psychiatrists and counsellors, who say that they do see a large crop of young people coming in with drug abuse problems, which was not the case five years back.'
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There is growing evidence of staff smoking cannabis during work hours and abusing over-the-counter medicine to keep them going through their long night shifts.
More than a quarter of call centre workers used drugs, mainly cannabis, compared to just 4.1 per cent of the wider population, according to a study published in the Indian Journal of Sleep Medicine.
Last week, the UN Office on Drugs and Crime visited India's outsourcing capital of Bangalore to warn India's largest call centre companies of the problem and persuade them to cooperate with the first detailed survey on the issue.
Pradeep Kumar, the UN's project coordinator, said it is difficult to convince the major companies running call centres of the urgency of the issue.
'Denial runs pretty deep.' he said. 'And it's not because they don't know of the problem. They are vaguely aware of it, but it's not really a priority.'
He said the UNODC had decided to target Indian call centres after being alerted to the growing problem of drug use by doctors running clinics near the main call centre areas in Bangalore and Gurgaon on outskirts of Delhi.
'It was a matter of anecdotal evidence coming from the GPs, psychiatrists and counsellors, who say that they do see a large crop of young people coming in with drug abuse problems, which was not the case five years back.'
Read More Article...
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