Mumbai, March 1: Hindustan Lever Ltd today washed its hands of tea plantations business by selling its entire stake in Tea Estates India Ltd, its wholly-owned subsidiary, to Maxwell Golden Tea Private Ltd. Maxwell Golden Tea is a Woodbriar group company.

Hindustan Lever had divested its stake in Rossell Industries to MK Shah Exports last year and had sold its 100 per cent shareholding in Doom Dooma Tea Company in Assam to McLeaod Russel India in January this year.

Tea Estates India owns eight tea estates and six factories for processing tea in the high-yielding belt of Tamil Nadu with an average annual output of approximately 10,500 metric tonnes.

With the transfer of shareholding in Tea Estates India, Hindustan Lever has completely moved out of tea plantations business both in south India and Assam.

The Woodbriar group, which has interests in tea plantations, insurance services and real estate in the US, owns tea gardens through Maxwell in the premium tea growing regions in Tamilnadu and Kerala.

“The transfer of Tea Estate shareholding to Woodbriar is in the best interest of the tea plantation business and all its stakeholders,” said a statement from Hindustan Lever.

It added that the existing terms and conditions of services of all Tea Estate India employees will be fully protected in accordance with applicable laws and terms of their employment.

“The acquisition of Tea Estates by Woodbriar group will provide scale and bring in synergy benefits to the group, as a large portion of TEIL gardens are contiguous to the existing tea gardens of Woodbriar group,” the group said in a release.

DSP Merrill Lunch was the adviser to Hindustan Lever to broker the deal and Woodbriar borrowed money from Canara Bank to fund the acquisition.