Guwahati: When it comes to Assam, few would argue that tea is its greatest cash crop. But while tea has given so much to Assam, those working in the tea industry continue to live substandard lives and now the same has been confirmed by the Comptroller and Auditor General of India.
The Performance Audit on the Implementation of Schemes for Welfare of Tea Tribes in Assam (Report No. 5 of 2024), presented in the Assam Assembly, reveals some harsh realities but for those working in the tea industry, this hardly comes as a surprise. Of the 800 tea gardens, 176 lack medical facilities.
Since employment in tea plantations was not a part of scheduled employment notified by the Government of Assam, tea garden labourers do not get the benefit of minimum wage. Additionally, 11 tea estates were paying less cash wage to workers than the prescribed amount, while poorly maintained houses, lack of proper drinking water, sanitation, and drainage systems in labour lines were also prevalent.
The Performance Audit (PA) was conducted on the implementation of schemes for the welfare of tea tribes for the period 2015-16 to 2020-21 in Assam. The PA aimed to investigate poor socio-economic, health, and education indicators in tea estates.
The welfare of tea tribes is a shared responsibility between the State Government and the Plantation Management under the Plantations Labour Act, 1951. There are 390 tea estates in the four sampled zones, of which 40 tea estates (10 per cent) were selected for audit based on the size of the plantations and the number of workers employed.
The implementation of PLA, 1951, and the Minimum Wages Act, 1948, in tea estates was found to be deficient. In terms of healthcare, not all tea estates had garden hospitals, and those that did suffered from a lack of infrastructure and manpower.
There are a total of 800 tea gardens in Assam, of which 414 have tea garden hospitals, 210 have dispensaries, and the remaining 176 tea estates have no healthcare facilities. “This means that 386 tea gardens do not have tea garden hospitals, with 176 of them lacking any medical facilities whatsoever,” the report said.
Out of 40 test-checked Tea Estates (TEs), 26 TEs had Tea Garden Hospitals (TGHs), 10 TEs had dispensaries, and the remaining four TEs did not have any medical facilities for workers. “The buildings of 16 out of 36 hospitals/dispensaries were in poor condition. Drinking water facility was not available in 15 TEs,” the report said.
Housing facilities for tea workers were inadequate, with poorly maintained houses, lack of proper drinking water, sanitation, and basic amenities in labour houses/lines.
Regarding the Minimum Wage Act, the State Government’s intervention in fixing minimum wages for tea workers was insufficient. The report said employment in tea plantations was not a part of scheduled employment notified by the Government of Assam, as a result of which tea garden labourers did not get the benefit of minimum wage.
The department stated (March 2021) that from the initial stage, the labour unions of the tea workers were in the practice of negotiating with the management associations to fix wage rates. This indicated that the State Government had left the matter of tea workers’ wages in the hands of the planters and workers’ associations, instead of bringing it under the ambit of the Minimum Wages Act.
In Assam, traditionally, the wages for workers of tea plantations are paid partly in cash and partly in kind. “However, the authorisation granted by the Government for payment of wages partly in kind was not available on record. The Labour Department was also not aware of the year of commencement of payment of wages in kind and the purpose for the same,” the report says.
“Assam government’s involvement in ensuring the minimum wages for a long period of 62 years has been minimal, which led to wages being decided in an ad hoc manner—first through bipartite agreements and then by suo motu announcement of enhancements by the Government, which were also only interim in nature.
Moreover, the Government had never intervened to address the issue of disparity in wage rates in Brahmaputra Valley and Barak Valley, where Barak Valley had, for a long period of time, been receiving at least 10 per cent lower wage rates, and the recent government notifications are also continuing the same practice without stating any reasons for the difference in wage rates,” the report said.
“In the course of the exit meeting held on 15 February 2022, the Secretary, Labour and Welfare Department, stated that the audit findings had rightly highlighted the facts. He further stated that illiteracy and lack of awareness among the tea garden community were some of the prime reasons behind their backwardness,” the report said.
As regards the implementation of the Minimum Wages Act, he stated that when the government introduced initiatives to increase the wages of tea workers, the same got challenged in the court of law and, therefore, the wages could not be increased as desired by the Government of Assam.
Also Read: Bitter brew: Does the tea industy face an uncertain future?
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