Tea bonus meet deadlocked

TT, 1 October 2019, Darjeeling/Alipurduar: A tripartite meeting convened by the state labour department in Calcutta on Monday to settle the rate of bonus for tea workers serving in 87 tea estates of the hills failed to come to a decision.

As no decision has been reached on the meeting, it is uncertain now as whether the workers will receive bonus ahead of Puja. This is more because the next meeting on the issue has been convened on October 17 when the festivities would be over.

At the meeting, which commenced at 4pm and continued for four-and-half hours, unions that had demanding a bonus of 19. 5 per cent scaled it down to 19 per cent.

The planters, on the other hand, said they are ready to pay bonus at 15 per cent. Earlier, they had proposed a bonus of 10.5 per cent.

"It is unfortunate that no decision could be reached at the meeting. We want the issue to be resolved and hope the trade unions will understand our situation," said Sandeep Mukherjee, principal adviser, Darjeeling Tea Association.

With the meeting not turning out to be fruitful, the unions have decided to go ahead with protests. They will continue to hold meeting at the gates of each tea garden every day and stop dispatch of tea, like they have been doing for the past two days, the union leaders said.

"In next couple of days, we will sit and discuss on what would be our further course of action," said Amar Lama, a senior trade union leader who was present at the meeting.

Meanwhile, in Alipurduar, the rate of bonus for the workers of Rahimabad tea estate was finalised at a tripartite meeting convened by the state labour department administration.

It has been decided the workers of Rahimabad will get bonus at the rate of 15.1 per cent on October 3. It is one of those 14 gardens which had walked out of the industry wide wage agreement that was signed for tea gardens of the Terai and the Dooars on September 23.

However, the management of Torsha, another tea estate whose representatives were also called at the meeting to decide on the same issue, said they would pay bonus after Puja.

"The management of Torsha have said that they will disburse a fortnight's wage on October 3. However, they will pay the bonus only after the puja," said Gopal Pradhan, president, Dooars Cha Bagan Workers' Union.

Such assertion by the management has left workers irate at the garden.

"We will launch protests at the garden from Tuesday. The management should finalise the bonus rate and pay us ahead of the festivities," said a worker of the Torsha tea garden..