The Hindu Business Line : Revival package sought for ailing tea gardens

Kolkata May 15 Mr Shashank Prashad, the newly elected President of Tea Association of India, in a statement has urged the Union Government to declare a package for relief and rehabilitation for a large number of ailing but not closed tea gardens on the same line the package being finalised for the closed gardens.

There were many ailing tea gardens in Dooars & Terai in North Bengal as also in both Brhamaputra and Barak valleys of Assam and the unprecedented crisis in the tea industry over the past seven years has rendered many gardens financially unviable.

"Although these gardens are somehow managing to run their operations, structurally they are sick and some of them are on the brink of closure," Mr Prashad said with an appeal to the Union Minister of State for Commerce, Mr Jairam Ramesh, for extending his help to these gardens.

`Restructure loans'

The relief and rehabilitation package for ailing gardens, according to him, should comprise restructuring of bank loans, a subsidy on interest rates, waiver of penal interest and fines on Provident Fund arrears and a special financial facility at concessional rate of interest.

Mr Prashad, however, added that the package could only be an interim measure providing some breather to the distressed gardens. For long-term survival, cost of production must be brought down and one way to achieve it would be to free the gardens from their obligations to meet the social costs, he added.