One evening Jaasree, a young colleague of mine, stumbled into my cabin with a sheaf of papers and stared at me, as though to enquire if I were ready for a dig at them. In the course of exploration, our focus shifted to `employee privacy' at workplaces. She suddenly became emotional, perhaps because of the topic being dearer to her heart, and proclaimed: "Employees do need privacy and in - fact, everyone of us craves to have private space for him/her in the organization and hence, employers should provide it. I was wonder-struck: What is it that the employees need to hide from employer? What prompts an employer to peep into employee's mind? Why employer is eager to know more about his/her employee? What is this `employer-employee' chasm on `privacy' all about? Is it true, as JK said, "The problem is not the world, but you in relationship with another; which creates a problem; and that problem extended becomes the world problem"? The article proposes to examine this.

With the advent of technological progression in computation and communication, and the resulting facilities such as electronic mailing, instant transmission of messages, etc., `privacy' has become the buzzword in the corporate corridors, particularly in the western world. It is slowly making inroads into Indian businesses too. Today `privacy' at workplaces has become one of the most fundamental requirements of every employee. Employees are increasingly getting concerned about their right to privacy which should eliminate or minimize employers' intrusion.

According to Oxford dictionary, `privacy' means "the state or condition of being withdrawn from the society of others or from public attention; freedom from disturbance or intrusion; seclusion". Obviously, in the context of workplaces, privacy doesn't mean the state of being withdrawn from the organization, but what employees are seeking from their employers is freedom from intrusionintrusion into their e-mails, telephonic conversations, computer monitoring, keeping track of phone calls etc. According to American Management Association's survey, more than half of US companies engaged in some form of monitoring e-mails of employees and this is what is now being vehemently resisted by employees. Similarly, monitoring of computer terminals while one is working or scanning what is stored in the hard disc of an employee, gathering information about the phone calls made by the employee from the pen register etc., are all considered intrusions of the employer.

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