A Niti Aayog team is set to come on a three-day visit to north Bengal next week for talks with stakeholders of the tea industry.
In recent years, this is the first time that the Narendra Modi government is sending such a high-level team to north Bengal.
According to officials of the Tea Board of India, the team from the Development Monitoring and Evaluation Office (DMEO), a wing of the Niti Aayog, will reach here on October 27 and will meet representatives of tea associations, small tea growers and others belonging to the tea sector that even today provides employment to around 10 lakhs people in the region in a direct and indirect manner.
The DMEO, sources said, is tasked with the responsibility to monitor and evaluate the implementation of schemes, programmes and initiatives of the Centre and come up with policies and recommendations.
“They will meet officials of the tea board and the tea board’s quality control laboratory (at the tea park in New Jalpaiguri). They will attend meetings with representatives of tea planters’ associations based in the Terai and owners of bought-leaf factories. On October 28, they will visit Jalpaiguri,” said a source in the tea board.
In Jalpaiguri, the team will meet small tea growers and tea planters’ associations based in the Dooars. On the third day, they will visit a site in Ghoshpukur (on the outskirts of Siliguri) where there is a self-help group of small tea growers.
In the past seven years, that is, since 2014, the BJP has managed to consolidate its support base in the tea belt. In the 2019 Lok Sabha polls, the party could win all the parliament ary seats that cover the tea estates. In the Assembly elections, the saffron party could manage to win most of the seats in the tea belt.
Political observers, when asked to comment on the sudden visit of the Niti Aayog team, said this might be the Centre’s attempt to placate tea workers and their families as an undercurrent of discontent can be seen among them these days.
“Even though they had voted for the BJP, the Narendra Modi government at the Centre has not done much for them. Earlier this year, a sum of Rs 1,000 crore was allocated for the development of women and children in tea estates of Assam and Bengal but not a penny has come to these people so far. The upcoming visit by a Niti Aayog team hints that the Centre has something in mind for them,” said an observer.