Tea workers in sub-human state: Survey

TNN | Dec 4, 2015, KOLKATA: Workers in north Bengal tea estates live sub-human lives, with neither the government nor the garden authorities taking measures to mitigate their plight, reveals a survey by the international Fact Finding Mission (FFM), which undertook the exercise following a series of deaths in the gardens, allegedly owing to malnutrition. 

The survey has come across several cases of undeclared and illegal closure of tea gardens, a major cause of concern for workers and their unions, who can not even fight against the appaling working condition. Companies disregarded the existing national laws and Acts that regulated labour relations in tea gardens, revealed the survey. 

The FMM, headed by the Global Network for the Right to Food and Nutrition (GNRtFN), visited tea plantations in Assam and Bengal from November 27 to December 3. The objective of the mission was to investigate the status of the human rights of garden workers, including to food and nutrition, and the role played by the managements to ensure those. The FFM, which will prepare a report and share it with the state and central governments, is scheduled to alert international labour organizations on the apparently violation of labour laws in the tea estates. 

The organization met the state finance minister, Amit Mitra, and labour minister Malay Ghatak at the state secretariat on Thursday and apprised them of the current scene, but the two apparently tried to shrug off responsibility . "Both the ministers said these tea es tates were governed by central law. So they could not do much beyond forming a task force, which is reportedly keeping a close watch on the development," said Anuradha Talwar of Right to Food, India. 

According to the survey , tea garden workers and their families continue to earn wages way below the amount meant to ensure decent living and face food shortage. Currently , a labourer was paid a daily wage of Rs 122.50, which did not suffice for the minimum expenditure of workers' families, said a member of the organization. This apathy by the management especially affected the families as they were usually single-handedly run by women, who represented close to 70% of the workforce in the estates, said Yifang Tang, one of the members of the Fact Finding Mission. Accor ding to a source, most of the male members of the workers' families could hardly hold onto a job that ensured proper salary . 

"We also spoke to the tea estate authorities. The management representatives of one of the tea estates claimed the tea business was not feasible anymore and so they could not pay the workers more. But we checked the website of the company and found that it had made a profit of 11% this year, said Tang. "What we have estimated that from the average price of tea, which is paid by an international or Indian consumer, a worker gets paid less than even 1% per kg. This is a drastic situation, especially when workers toil in the plantations amid abject working condition, said Flavio Valenle, of FIAN International, who was part of the survey .