Srinivas T’s life came crashing when his father met with a road accident. The 25-year-old senior proof reader with Bangalore-based medical transcription firm Healthscribe India was already coping with his mother’s debilitating osteoporosis, when he saw his father slowly slip into coma following a brain injury.

With both parents to nurse, Srinivas knew it was impossible to return to work. He decided to quit his job.

When the young proof reader e-mailed his resignation letter, the company’s HR manager wrote back with an alternative. “I was told that the company allowed employees to work from home,” says Srinivas. He jumped at the option. Within a week of this e-mail exchange, Srinivas’ computer at home had been loaded with the company software and a broadband connection. And he got to work ? from his bedroom.

Srinivas is one among Healthscribe’s 180 employees who work out of their homes. Says Surya V Siryam, vice-president, HR, Healthscribe, “A lot of employees quit for personal reasons. This policy is an attempt to retain this workforce.”

Working from home ? or telecommuting ? has gained rapid ground in Bangalore’s software industry. IBM allows employees (project managers upwards) to work from home. Accenture is more democratic ? all employees in functional areas like human resources (HR), finance, marketing and information technology (IT) can telecommute.

By 2006, Bangalore-based IT firm Yodlee Infotech Pvt Ltd plans to make telecommuting available to all its 150 employees. “All employees will be provided a computer, telephone and broadband connection at home as part of their salary component,” says Neelkanthan Natarajan, vice-president, Yodlee Infotech.

Telecommuting is having an impact on the families of those who work at home. Dr Ali Khwaja, head of Bangalore-based counselling centre Banjara Academy, says parents who work from home have more secure children. “It breeds insecurity in a child to see both parents rushing off to work in the morning and returning from school to an empty house. Even one parent at home can kill this feeling,” he says.

Working parents are bringing up a latch-key generation, he adds. “These children can grow into aggressive, angry adults. A parent’s constant presence in a child’s life can counter this trend,” he adds.

Srinivas of Healthscribe says his being home all day is a big comfort for his mother. “She knows I am around to rush my father to hospital if there’s an emergency,” he says.

Jyoti Rao, a proof reader at Healthscribe, was determined that motherhood would not come in the way of her career. When her son was born in 2001, she put him in a cr?che and joined work. Rao’s resolve melted in a month. She felt guilty every morning when she dropped her boy at the cr?che. “I worried for him the whole day and I would call the cr?che every half an hour,” she recalls.

When Healthscribe introduced its telecommuting policy, Rao was among the first to sign up. Rao says she saw a marked change in her son once he stopped spending his days in the cr?che. “He used to be a quiet, introvert child. Ever since I started working from home, he’s become more affectionate and confident,” she says.

Telecommuting is a natural fall-out in an industry that works long and erratic hours. Take the case of Yodlee. “We need to be a 24/7 shop to service clients across the globe. Working long and late hours is a part of the job,” says Natarajan.

The work-from-home culture is picking up for various reasons. For Bangalore’s growing migratory work force ? which doesn’t have an extended family to fall back on ? it’s a way of balancing home and work. “In nuclear families, there’s no one to look after children. Women have to quit work,” says Rahul Varma, India HR director, Accenture.

Telecommuting doesn’t solve women’s woes only. Of the 180 home-working employees at Healthscribe, 83 are men. Men are equally enthusiastic about the policy, says Healthscribe’s Siryam. “We have several male employees whose wives work for companies that don’t offer telecommuting. So the men stay home and take care of the family,” he adds.

Arkaprabha Mandal, senior specialist, enterprise, at Accenture, has a special work corner marked out at home. It’s a strictly noise-free zone, where he takes his conference calls. Mandal’s young daughter falls ill often. Telecommuting helps him look after her even as he meets official deadlines. “My anxiety levels decreased drastically once I started working from home,” says Mandal.

Telecommuting came to India riding the technology wave. “Technology comes at no cost now. Companies can provide employees with computers and broadband connections without worrying about its bottom line,” says Yodlee’s Natarajan.

Moreover, as IT companies do business across the globe, distance becomes a non-issue. “Work happens online. It’s immaterial whether people sit three cubicles or three continents away,” adds Natarajan.

Telecommuting remains a need-based option in Indian firms. “We see the urgency of an employee’s need,” says Healthscribe’s Siryam.

The other criterion is consistent performance. At Healthscribe, employees need to pass a quality assurance course and have to be consistently independent in their work if they wish to telecommute. “Employees who regularly rush to the team leader for help are unfit candidates,” says Siryam.

Although new to India, telecommuting already has some die-hard fans. Healthscribe’s telecommuting couple Satya Das and Laxmi Das never want to work out of an office again. They opted to work from home when their son was born two years ago. “Earlier I came home only to eat and sleep. Now we have all the time for each other,” Laxmi Das says.