Maruti chairman RC Bhargava set the cat among the pigeons when he said the company would not hire any contract workers—whether through contractors or Maruti’s HR department—for its core operations after March 2013. Given that permanent shopfloor employees earn R22,000 per month as compared to R10,000 or so for contract workers, expect a sharp hike in next fiscal’s wage bill. And given Maruti’s leadership position, presumably this means the practice will spread to other auto firms and, in time, to non-auto firms as well Getting to labour heaven, however, will take a lot more than just hiring permanent staffers.