‘No amount of meditation sessions will fix that’: Venture capitalist Dilip Kumar on employee stress

Stating that 64% of employees in India report high workplace stress and burnout, Kumar wrote in a post X which has gotten over 120,000 views that “it’s not about step challenges, yoga, Zumba sessions, or Friday parties.”

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He went on to explain that stress is not caused by long hours alone, but by the “rigid work culture.”

“Being stuck in a 9-to-6 cycle, drowning in meetings, commuting for hours, and worrying about not being there for family. That’s the real health hazard,” he wrote.

“No amount of meditation sessions will fix that,” added Kumar who heads Rainmatter, the venture fund of brokerage Zerodha. Rainmatter is invested into FITTR, The Whole Truth, Ultrahuman, Devil Circuit, Aroleap, HumanEdge, GameTheory, Trunativ, Akshyakalpa, Two Brothers Organic, and TWF flours among others.

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Kumar emphasised that companies should “let people work async. Let them go for a run in the afternoon. Let them sleep in when their body needs it. Let them care for their kids or aging parents—without guilt or permission.”

“The healthiest employees aren’t in wellness programs—they’re designing their own lives,” he concluded. “The rest is noise.”

Kumar’s views come at a time when discussions on work-life balance and employee wellness have become prominent.

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The most infamous examples are of Infosys Co-Founder and Chairman Emeritus Narayana Murthy advocating for a 70-hour workweek and Larsen & Toubro Chairman S N Subrahmanyan telling he wants to make employees work on Sundays as well.

Both of these cases were controversial, and were met with severe backlash online.