For 2023-24 fiscal: Tea garden owners ‘advised’ to pay 16% bonus

Kolkata: The Labour Department, on Tuesday, issued an advisory for tea gardens’ management to provide bonuses to the workers at the rate of 16 per cent in Darjeeling, Kurseong and Kalimpong hills for the accounting year 2023-24.

The tea garden workers get wages of Rs 250 per day, on a no-work-no-pay basis. However, several factors are taken into consideration when calculating the bonus percentage.

Requesting the representatives of management and trade unions to ensure industrial peace, harmony and discipline in the tea gardens, the advisory has stated that bonus should be disbursed within October 4.

“Durga Puja and Dussehra festivals are very near. It has become urgent and necessary that the bonus to the tea garden workers is disbursed immediately by the management of respective tea garden’s management without any further delay. Whereas, considering the unrest and confusion among the workers, and in view of the ensuing festive season, we are of the opinion that workers and their families should not be deprived of their festivities owing to such impasse. Therefore, while maintaining the parity throughout the tea industry in the state in the view of a series of negotiations, and also in the view of the imminent festive season, we have issued the advisory,” said a Labour department official.

The advisory states that regarding the severely financially stressed gardens, their rate of bonus and subsequent disbursement may be decided at a bipartite level by the management and trade unions, if so required. It further asserts that in case of any dispute, management and workers may raise the issue through their representatives once the festive season is over. An industry-wise bipartite settlement was already made where bonus was fixed at the rate of 16 per cent for tea gardens of Terai and Dooars region on September 19 and disbursement of the same is in full swing.

The Bonus Act 1965 mandates that the tea garden workers have to be paid at least 8.33 per cent as bonus. However, in the tea gardens in the Hills, the owners have been paying workers, bonus at a rate of 20 per cent for the last few years. Last year, 19 per cent was paid to the workers. However, this year, due to erratic weather conditions in the Hills that included heavy rain as well as extreme heat, tea cultivation was hit and the owners have been rigid that they won’t pay above 13 per cent. The workers are insisting upon a 20 per cent bonus. The state Labour department has initiated a number of meetings in this regard but there has been no solution.