The Hindu Business Line : Bengal urged to set up body for vetting EOIs by tea cos

The Minister said it has been decided to effect a ten-fold increase in allocation for social welfare measures in tea gardens from Rs 5 crore to Rs 50 crore.

Mohan Padmanabhan

Jalpaiguri (North Bengal), June 29

Pointing out that some 45 tea gardens in West Bengal have been selected for loan/subsidy disbursement till date (out of 81 applications received from tea companies so far) under the Government’s Special Purpose Tea Fund (SPTF) scheme for productivity enhancement in the tea sector, Mr Jairam Ramesh, Union Minister of State for Commerce & Industry, said here today that talks would be held soon with the West Bengal Government to put in place a machinery to evaluate EOIs pouring in from various tea companies for SPTF.

The Minister said it has been decided to effect a ten-fold increase in allocation for social welfare measures in tea gardens (water, health, education of workers’ children etc), from Rs 5 crore to Rs 50 crore.

The first charge on this will go to the 30,000 workers of the closed tea gardens, and the expenditure will begin this year itself. In short, it is pouring manna for the tea gardens – SPTF, special package for closed gardens and now more funds for workers’ measures.

The minister, speaking at the loan agreement signing ceremony for the first round of SPTF for West Bengal, formally launched here, said the Tea Board has been flooded with EOIs, and careful sifting of the serious from the non-serious applicant has to be done.

New approach

He called for a new approach was needed to find new owners for the 13 closed/sick tea gardens in Bengal, employing thousands of workers, 50 per cent of whom are women.

He said the approach may also involve invoking of Section 16D of the Tea Board Act under which gardens may be taken away legally from absentee owners and handed over to new entrepreneurs willing to run the garden professionally.

Citing the example of both Kanan Devan Hills Plantations in Kerala, now working under a worker-owned professionally managed set-up and Durgabari Tea Estate in Tripura, run by a workers’ cooperative, the minister said efforts were on to bring some of the big closed gardens in the Dooars area such as Chamurchi, Samsing and Bharnobari.

He expected that at least a few more gardens out of the 13 left would be happened in the near future.

Surendra Nagar Tea Estate, belonging to the Red Bank Group, is the only one which has opened so far.

Earlier, Mr Basudeb Banerjee, Chairman of Tea Board, said combined with the high percentage of senile tea bushes (over 50 years old) in North Bengal, and the lower price realisation for tea at the farm gate between 1999 and 2004 has taken its toll.

Pointing out that rate of re-plantation was low in the Indian tea sector, denting our international competitiveness against nations such as Kenya and Vietnam, he said some 132 companies will receive assistance against the 262 applications received so far.

More Stories on : Tea | Agricultural Policy | West Bengal

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