Bangalore: Being India’s biggest scam until now, 2G Spectrum Scandal is to affect 10,000 employees as Supreme Court has quashed 122 telecom licences in the latest verdict. The Supreme Court order will affect the 2008 issued scandal-infected telecom licences. Though, the cancellation will affect less than 5 percent of users in India, around 10,000 jobs in the telecom sector will be distressed. 

TNN reports that approximately 4,000 direct jobs and more than 6,000 indirect jobs in the telecom sector will be trimmed down in telecom sales, customer support, and tower management and maintenance jobs.  According to the report, Uninor will be the main accused telecom corporate which is to be impacted very badly by the latest verdict. 

Unitech promoted Uninor had 26 million customers as of 2011 second quarter. And it had a sales force of 7,000 people excepting the 2,200 direct employees. 2,000 employees of Uninor in India are to lose their jobs as the licences cancelled. About 500 in Etisalat and 200 in S-Tel may be also lose their jobs, but considerable the amount is less as the two companies are yet to start their services, the telecom experts said to TNN.

"Every direct job in telecom creates another two or three jobs outside,'' said Kriti Srivastav, an HR professional said to TNN. “The bigger issue is, those who lose jobs will not find it easy to find alternatives within industry. Baburajan K, lead analyst at the telecom focused portal TelecomLead.com, noted that telecom has been going through a turbulent period and thousands of telecom jobs are vanishing globally. "Nokia Siemens Network alone is cutting some 17,000 jobs."

CEO of recruitment firm The Head Hunters India, Kris Lakshmikanth told that, the sector is seeing only very limited and need-based hiring. During 2008 and 2009, telecom professionals used to jump jobs with salary hikes of 50 percent. But in 2011, many had to accept offers at a 30 percent cut. Today, even such offers are not available.