Psychological pressure and stress on employees during ‘unlock-1’: A case study

The world is going through a critical situation with confirmed cases of coronavirus crossing the 10, 11 and 12 million marks on 27 June, 6 July and 9 July 2020, respectively, within 6 months after the outbreak was officially reported by China. In the world, 1,95,263 confirmed cases were noted in a single day on 27 June followed by 1,92,700 on 29 June 2020. Initially, the spread of COVID-19 was restricted with the strict compliance of ‘lockdown’ along with the countrywide ‘curfew’ in India. However, since the ‘Unlock-1’ phase has started the speedy spread of coronavirus has been noticed. There is no doubt that early and strict restrictions have given adequate time for the healthcare system to gear up to take the forthcoming challenges from coronavirus. Once the lockdown has been lifted and movements were permitted, office goers, and especially people dealing with the public are facing tough challenges with regard to psychological pressure and stress to protect themselves from being infected. With Delhi having the second/third highest number of positive cases, together with seven other states, it accounts for 87% of the total cases and 85.50% active cases across the country. In the present article, the authors attempt to study the psychological pressure and stress factors impacting the employees through a case study. The study reveals that overall 99.5% of employees take proper precautionary measures and ‘wear masks’ and 96.6% of employees prefer to work online. Maximum psychological pressure and stress are felt by employees—89% from ‘stress of financial constrains’ followed by ‘stress of job insecurity/instability with 84%.