The North Eastern Tea Association (NETA) has appreciated the Assam government’s budget proposal for allowing the tea estates to undertake non-tea activities to generate additional revenue.
The State’s budget for the 2022-23 fiscal, read out by Finance and Social Welfare Minister of Assam Ajanta Neog, proposed 50 tea tourism projects inside tea gardens. Such projects backed by the government are expected to boost the tourism sector in Assam, the NETA said.
The industry has also been enthused by the proposal to permit tea gardens to undertake non-tea activities such as agro-forestry and solar power projects. The NETA said this would help the estates, under stress for years, financially.
“The exemption of cess on green tea leaves for another three years with effect from January 1, 2022, is another welcome step. The continuation of the Assam Tea Industries Special Incentives Scheme for one more year will also be of big help for tea industry,” NETA chairman Kamal Jalan said.
The cess on green tea, exempted in 2019 through a gazette notification, was 10 paise per kg of green leaf for gardens up to 40 hectares and 40 paise for larger estates.
Several proposals for the welfare of “tea tribes” have been made in the Budget. They include bringing 436 schools run by the estates under the ambit of the State government, making 117 model high schools in the gardens operation from May 10, skilling young plantation workers across 800 tea estates and covering the 2.9-lakh households under the Jal Jeevan Mission.
The Budget has also given ample space to the tribes and other indigenous communities seen to have voted the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) back to power in Assam along with the “tea tribes”.
One of the proposals was allowing a tribal family to own up to 50 bighas of land by removing the upper ceiling of 8 bighas under the Assam Land Policy, 2019. The government has also proposed a Budget allocation of ₹75-crore for a land-related mission that includes earmarking new village grazing reserve and professional grazing reserve to the indigenous people.
