Disbursement of festival bonus by tea garden collectives

Tea garden workers are successfully and very efficiently running tea gardens themselves after management abandoned them. Paschim Banga Khet Majoor Samity took steps in Madhu, Birpara and Raipur tea gardens by setting up and supporting collective groups to run the tea gardens after the management abandoned these tea gardens. The tea garden workers were devastated after the management abandoned these gardens as the tea garden workers were completely dependent on tea gardens for their survival. These tea gardens are now running successfully by the collectives and even saving a surplus amount.

The collective members preparing to distribute the bonus  

1. The Birpara tea garden was abandoned by the management for many years. In August 2019 a collective was formed and 1300 workers started working on 405 acres. These workers would usually earn Rs 180 per day for plucking tea leaves and the collective sells these leaves to brokers according to whoever gives the highest price. The collective started saving right from September 2019 and now has successfully saved Rs 1 crore  and 65 thousands by selling tea leaves. The collective has decided to distribute surplus savings among all the members Each tea garden worker of Birpara has received Rs 11280 as bonus from the surplus savings on October 7,2020.

The workers collecting their bonus(s) from the collective office

2. Madhu Tea Estate  was abandoned by management in 2014. In January 2019, a collective was formed by some of the women to run the tea garden. This garden has 75 women members who started working on 25 acres and they would earn Rs 10 per kg for tea plucking. This ensured that these women could earn Rs 200-250 per day and even Rs 400 on some days.The collective would then sell these leaves in the wholesale market.  The collective ran the garden so efficiently that they successfully started saving a surplus amount. The collective saved Rs 1,88,955 till September 2019 and distributed these savings as bonus among tea garden workers. Continuing their successful campaign of the previous year the Madhu Bagan Collective saved Rs 2.5 lakhs till September 2020. The collective has decided to distribute a surplus amount of Rs 2 lakhs equally among all the members of the Madhu tea garden as a bonus and to invest the rest amount to run the garden.

 

3. Raipur tea garden also was abandoned by the management in September 2018. On 12 September 2018 tea workers formed a collective to run the tea garden. This garden has 617 members who started working and they would earn Rs 150 per day for plucking tea leaves which the Operating Management Committee(OMC) sell to wholesalers.  The OMC started saving and they have successfully saved Rs. 32 lakhs and13 thousands. The collective has decided to run the tea garden through their savings.

 

PBKMS is now exploring the possibility of making and selling hand made tea in Madhu and Birpara, so as to ensure value added and higher incomes for the workers.