My 2 paishe on Service Charge culturein Pune, especially in areas like KP, Viman, and Aundh-Baner

Have seen an uptick in restaurants and even cafes adding service charge freely to their bills. Many do remove it but I've had a couple of experiences where 1. they said they couldn't but then added a discount of the same amount 2. they said they couldn't remove it from the system but you can pay the reduced amount. One was an establishment where they just served you icecream/gelato like any other parlour. Now before hoteliers get on this and justify how the industry isn't as profitable and that this is necessary to keep the lights on and is good for the servers/waiters -- I really don't think customers are supposed to care about all that. If you want your serves to earn more, pay them more. If you don't want to add that cost to your expenses, make the menu more expensive, add up the cost to the items you're selling. I would appeal to everyone here to insist on removing the service charge. Tip if you want, but because you want to. Not as 'staff welfare' or anything of the sort. Why is this such an issue? Why should I ask you to do something? Because if this is made common and you don't really raise this as a problem, they hotel lobby would be able to circumvent the government order for service charges. Eventually, service charges would no longer be just 'optional' and then in a few years' time, you'll have 10% extra tax as the BASELINE, just like America. I would also like to draw attention to incidents at pubs and restaurants where the staff threatened customers with violence, intimidating them into paying the service charge. Eventually police had to be called in. I've now made it a habit to get the jug and the dish from the server's hands the moment they come to the table. I insist on serving myself, no need for the fork and spoon serving shenanigans. Now there might be others who'll say you're paying for the experience and I shouldn't be going to restaurants where they have service charges. To that I say, why. Charge all you want based on what's legal and what you're entitled to. You're not entitled to your customers taking up the brunt of your expenses. Tl;dr: don't pay service charge, insist on getting it removed. Tip if you want, separately. It sets a bad precedent and things could go downhill soon.