Alipurduar: More than 50 tea estates across Alipurduar and Jalpaiguri districts have suffered extensive damage as floodwaters from Bhutan breached river embankments, submerging plantations and destroying infrastructure. The devastation has left thousands of workers displaced and the tea industry in distress.
During a visit to flood-affected areas in Nagrakata block on Monday, Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee assured that the state government, in coordination with tea garden authorities, would jointly assess the losses and initiate restoration measures. “The damage to the tea gardens is being jointly assessed by the management and the government. Once the water recedes, we will determine the full extent of loss. The government has always stood by affected families and will continue to do so,” the Chief Minister said.
The flooding, triggered by continuous heavy rainfall and water flowing in from Bhutan, has impacted tea estates across Alipurduar, Jalpaiguri and Cooch Behar districts. Several gardens recorded between 6 and 12 inches of rain on Sunday alone.
In Alipurduar’s Kalchini block, the embankment of the Torsa River near Subhashini Tea Estate gave way, flooding over 50 hectares of plantation and forcing nearly 200 residents to evacuate. The Chengmari Tea Estate, the largest in Bengal, suffered an estimated ₹8 crore loss as floodwaters entered both its factories, damaging stocks of green and CTC tea.
In Bamandanga–Tundu Tea Estate in Jalpaiguri, several people were swept away after a culvert collapsed. “The estate last saw such devastation in 1954,” said manager Surajit Ganguly, adding that more than 500 hectares of tea bushes were lost.
The Mainak Hill Tea Estate in Cooch Behar’s Mekhliganj subdivision has remained submerged under the Dharla River since Saturday night, while in Alipurduar, overflowing rivers like Torsa, Pana, and Basra have damaged several major estates.
Ram Avatar Sharma, Secretary of the Dooars branch of the Indian Tea Planters’ Association (ITPA), said, “The industry was already under severe strain, and now nature has turned against us. We are relying on government
support to rebuild.”
Experts attributed the large-scale devastation to runoff from Bhutan, which carries silt and dolomite downstream, damaging the tea soil. They urged the Centre to engage with Bhutan for a long-term flood management plan.