New Delhi, Aug 1 (UNI) BSNL employees union today strongly protested and opposed the BSNL's move seeking Voluntary Retirement Scheme (VRS) for its 20,000 employees.

''We demand the Government to drop the proposal,'' BSNL employees union General Secretary V A N Namboodiri said here.

The employees union has decided to go on strike on August 7, 2007 to protest the proposal to implement VRS.

State-owned Bharat Sanchar Nigam Ltd (BSNL) wrote to the Department of Telecommunication (DoT) seeking Voluntary Retirement Scheme (VRS) for its 20,000 employees to re-energise its ageing workforce yesterday.

The plea of the management seems to be that the workforce in BSNL is on an average about 40 years and new blood is required to deal with the new technology, Mr Namboodiri said.

''We do not have any objection in new recruitment but there is no question of imposing VRS,'' he added.

Every year, more than 10,000 employees are retiring in BSNL.

Since the formation of BSNL in 2000, more than 60,000 employees have already retired without any replacement, he said.

The telecom major will soon appoint 6,000 JTOs, 6,000 TTAs and managament trainees to strenghten its workforce.

UNI