The state labour department’s advisory to planters to provide workers bonus at 20 per cent rate of their annual wages is taking its toll on the north Bengal tea industry.

Workers have been protesting at several gardens that have expressed inability to pay 20 per cent bonus.

The protests have led to the closure of at least five tea estates, all in the Dooars so far, amid fears that some more tea companies might follow suit with workers not ready to accept bonus at a lower rate.

On Monday, workers in different tea estates resorted to protests against the management for offering bonus in installments or at lower rates.

“After the state issued its advisory last month, we had apprehensive that these kinds of situations might crop up. Many tea estates have financial constraints and cannot pay bonus at 20 per cent rate. It seems that our fears turned true. Within barely three months left for tea production, this is a fresh poser for the industry already confronting various challenges,” said a tea planter in Siliguri.

Usually, the bonus rate is fixed through bipartite talks among tea planters’ associations and tea trade unions. However, this year, the state labour department went ahead and issued an advisory, stating tea gardens should pay workers bonus at 20 per cent rate.

A senior manager posted at a tea estate in the Terai belt pointed out that during bipartite talks, once the bonus rate is fixed, a separate list of financially weak gardens is also prepared.

“The bonus rates of these gardens are usually lower than the fixed rate and they are decided on a case-by-case basis. But this time, there is no such scope for such flexibility because of the state’s blanket advisory,” he said.

In Jalpaiguri, the workers of Debpara and Totapara tea estate in Banarhat did not join work on Monday and resorted to demonstrations, demanding immediate payment of bonus.

“The management has not made any announcement regarding our bonus. Today (on Monday), we learned from sources that as of now, the management wants to pay us a portion of the bonus and give us the rest after the festive season. This is unacceptable,” said a worker who joined the protest.

In Grassmore, another tea estate in Jalpaiguri, the workers demonstrated in front of the garden’s office, alleging they had neither been paid their wages for weeks nor their bonus.

“We are yet to get wages for three to four fortnights. Now, we are being told that we will get bonus at 15 per cent rate. We won’t accept it,” said Sukurmani Oraon, a woman worker of the garden.

In the neighbouring Alipurduar district, workers confined the manager for two hours at Chinchula tea estate in Kalchini as the management offered bonus to them in two installments.

The Merico group, which runs seven tea estates in the district, has offered bonus in three installments, but workers are reluctant to accept it.

In the Terai, there have been similar protests in four to five gardens, while in the Darjeeling hills, workers of the Longview tea estate have alleged that the management has paid the bonus only to a chosen section of workers and not to all.

Local trade union leaders have initiated talks with the management of the gardens concerned for a solution.

“But the insistence of workers aware of the state’s advisory to pay workers bonus at 20 per cent and that too at one go has put some gardens in the soup,” said a representative of a tea planters’ association.