The voluntary retirement of Bharat Sanchar Nigam Limited (BSNL), the telecom sector of the Public sector, has received positive response. According to news agency PTI, 22,000 employees have applied for VRS in just two days of the announcement of the scheme.
A senior BSNL official said, "A total of 13,000 employees applying are in Group-C category. However, there is good response from every category of employees. "BSNL expects 70,000 to 80,000 employees to adopt the VRS scheme and this will save about Rs 7,000 crore in salary head. Let us know that the VRS scheme of BSNL was introduced on November 5 and it will remain open till December 3.
What is in VRS scheme?
Under the VRS scheme of BSNL, employees above the age of 53.5 years will get 125 per cent of their salary, which they can earn in the remaining period of their service. At the same time, employees between 50 and 53.5 years of age will be paid 80 to 100 percent of their salary, which they can get in the remaining period of their service. On selecting VRS, pension of employees above 55 years of age will be started only after they have completed 60 years.
Who is within the scope of the plan?
All regular and permanent employees of BSNL who have completed 50 years of age or above are eligible to apply for VRS. This includes employees who are working on deputation basis in other organizations outside BSNL. If you look at the numbers, BSNL currently has about 1.50 lakh employees. Out of this, about one lakh employees fall under VRS. Please tell that Mahanagar Telephone Nigam Limited (MTNL) has also implemented VRS for its employees. This plan of MTNL is till December 3.
69,000 Crore Revival Package
Last month, the Narendra Modi government announced a revival package of Rs 69,000 crore for BSNL and MTNL. This includes the merger of the two loss making public telecom companies, market their assets and give VRS to the employees. The objective of this step is to bring the post-merger entity to profit in two years.
