Jalpaiguri/New Delhi
When she flunked her Class 10 exams, Basanti Kujur (name changed), a resident of Jalpaiguri district in West Bengal known for its tea gardens, left behind her parents and sister to find a dream job in the southern tech city of Bengaluru.
“I checked my result online. It revealed, I had failed. I had studied hard and still could not pass. So, I thought of going to Bengaluru, helped by a friend’s male relative,” the minor told The Indian Tribal.
Like many tribals in the North Bengal region, of which Jalpaiguri is a part, Basanti’s parents also work in tea gardens. The payment is meagre. The women workers get Rs 250 per day for plucking tea leaves, a backbreaking job.
In the first week of June, a team of West Bengal police reached Bengaluru to rescue Basanti and her minor friend after an FIR was filed in Jalpaiguri by the former’s parents. As both the girls are minors, the man Sanjay Mahali, who is in his 40s, was arrested and lodged in the Bengaluru Central Jail.
During the conversation, Basanti insisted that she and her friend reached Bengaluru on their own. The trio had reached on May 12 and boarded the train back for West Bengal on June 4. All this while, the girls, aged 16 and 17, spent their time in a hostel. “I am happy to return and will never think of leaving again,” Basanti said.
The other girl, Savita Oraon (name changed) is in Class 10 and lives with her grandparents. Her mother works as a cook at local houses. “Till recently, my father used to work in a tea garden in Jalpaiguri. But as there is constant payment problem, he is now in Kerala for employment,” she said.
Changing Climate
North Bengal’s tea growing areas, Terai, Dooars and Darjeeling, are facing the brunt of climate change. In Darjeeling, which is part of the Eastern Himalayas, heavy rainfall triggered massive landslides which killed over 20 people last year.
Over the years, 13 tea gardens have closed down in Darjeeling. The situation is similar in the Terai and the Dooars. As tea gardens become unproductive and eventually turn non-functional driven by a changing climate, the labourers out-migrate for work.
The closure of tea gardens leaves the women vulnerable and prone to exploitation. Children, like Basanti and Savita, are often left to cope without safety nets and adequate protection as parents are in a constant state of anxiety over inadequate wages and the insecure nature of their work.
Besides metropolitan cities, even Jharkhand, Bihar and Odisha have turned into viable destinations for livelihood through mutual contacts and agents. But stepping outside puts women in a tight spot, said Rangu Souriya, a Siliguri resident who runs the Kanchanjunga Uddhar Kendra.
Over the years, Souriya has rescued many trafficked women. “When tea gardens close, trafficking increases, or at least the possibility of it. In many cases, women don’t have any other option but to migrate for work, and they fall into traps,” he pointed out.
Falling Production Driven By Climate Change
To a great extent, the closure of tea gardens in Darjeeling, the Dooars and the Terai is due to erratic climatic conditions. According to media reports, last year ahead of the festive season three gardens were shut in the Dooars. Facing the impact of extreme weather fluctuations, Darjeeling’s tea production has dropped from 12 million kilogrammes to six million kilogrammes in 2024, and this happened in just a decade.
A major problem is the nature of rainfall. Though the quantity remains the same, the showers have turned intense and are not evenly distributed. Then, there are long dry spells which worsen the situation. This gives rise to pest attacks which become difficult to control. If tea gardens, especially in the Dooars do not use pesticides, the production will drop by 70-80 per cent, a tea garden manager shared anonymously. In such a situation, several gardens making loss are shutting shop.
Amidst the closure of several tea gardens and large-scale migration, Mihir Gandhi of Cuppa Trade, an e-market place for tea, shared that marketing needs to be robust, at least for Darjeeling tea. “Darjeeling tea is consumed locally as well as exported to Europe and the US. But adequate marketing has not been carried out,” he said.
Darjeeling has 87 gardens spread over 19,000 hectares. So, the tea has to be marketed as a niche and upmarket product, said London-based travel agent Anthony Kingsley, who has a special interest in India due to his family’s legacy. Kingsley’s grandfather Edwin was one of the first tea planters in Liza Hill, Darjeeling.
“Coffee has been marketed well and it has become connected with the youth, but the same is lacking when it comes to tea. Many tea gardens could make use of their historical legacies to attract profits,” he opined.
Migration In Search Of Jobs, Vulnerability Of Women
Rajesh Roy, a small-scale tea garden owner in Jalpaiguri district, informed that migration has happened in almost every garden of North Bengal.
“The garden closed down 12 years back, then reopened and shut again. The management always runs away when it comes to workers’ wages and claims losses. As it is, wages are so low that it is almost impossible to run a family these days,” shared Nisha Yonjon, who once used to work in the Peshok tea garden in Darjeeling which was officially closed in 2019.
“I faced a lot of trouble after the garden closed down. For some time, I did farm work. Some of the others who worked with me went outside the State, and a few even left India. There are people from my place who work in export companies and beauty parlours. But sometimes, women find it a difficult proposition to leave their native place and start afresh in a new location,” she said.
Old habits die hard. Some former workers still pluck leaves in Peshok and sell them locally. But it is not easy, as abandoned tea gardens often turn into leopard habitats and without proper management, gardens are hard to run.
Nirnay Chettri, who heads non-profit MARG (Mankind in Action for Rural Growth) in Darjeeling, shared that trafficking escalates once productive tea gardens close. As it is, the economic condition is already bad and the workers somehow survive.
“However, when gardens close, the affected workers, especially women, try to reach out to their friends. In the process, they become vulnerable. In some cases, the women don’t want to come back as they feel that they have gone too far. Sometimes, they work in red light areas for survival,” Chettri said. MARG rescues such women after it receives distress calls.
Chettri tries to contact shelter homes in the destination cities to rescue trapped women, many of them tribals. Sometimes, it is difficult as many take new phone numbers. “The issues of tea garden closure and mass migration are linked to climate change, economic hardships and labour issues,” she averred.
Delhi-based Mission Mukti Foundation also tracks down women who migrate to big cities for work after the closure of tea gardens. Its head Virendra Singh said that many women from North Bengal’s tea regions work as house-helps in big cities. “But often they get trapped with restricted mobility and no payment. Some women end up in orchestra bands in Bihar,” he pointed out.
When Kumar Ashis was posted as the Saran Superintendent of Police, he had rescued such women sold in orchestra bars. Many of them lacked male family members which increased their vulnerability.
“Many women come from the tea garden areas of North Bengal. I rescued 295 women, including minors, from June 2024 till January 2026. Even then, a few women, who were not minors, said that they liked the profession and did not wish to return. Maybe, they had no other option. Sometimes, families also don’t accept the women after they are rescued,” he said.
The police officer, who is now DIG, Koshi Range, Saharsa, informed that Saran district has many orchestra bars in which the centuries-old traditional launda dance is promoted.
Sometimes, social workers intervene in an individual capacity. Priti Minz, who works on the menstrual health issue of female tea workers who work long hours without washroom facility, shared that once she had helped a woman in her late 20s to escape from a house in Kolkata.
Minz had lied about the demise of a family member of the victim, which helped the latter, return home. It would have been impossible otherwise as her movement was controlled, she shared.
The woman Priyasha Manjhi (name changed on request) had been to college but did not complete it due to financial constraints.
“As I couldn’t get any job in Kolkata, I tried an agent and finally landed as a cook at a house. I was promised Rs 15,000 a month, but after that it came down to Rs 10,000. There were restrictions placed on me. I wasn’t allowed to use my phone much. I had to stay in a store room and use a common toilet. At night, I was told to keep the door unlocked. On top of that, the man of the house gave me dirty looks which made me uncomfortable. Naturally, I somehow fled after two months of service,” the trafficking survivor said.
She took up the job to help run the family’s expense even though her brother, who works in Bengaluru, sends money. She shared that she never felt cooking was a bad kind of a job. “After all, those of us from the tea garden areas learn to cook since childhood as our parents leave early morning for work. Now, she doesn’t want to leave Jalpaiguri.
Amidst production decline due to climate change impacts, yet another example is that of Samita Bhumij (name changed) from Jalpaiguri district.
She shared that she too underwent physical violence as a house maid in the Punjabi Bagh area of Delhi. “I was sold by an agent for about Rs 45,000 in 2020. I used to work at a house in Siliguri but came to Delhi due to higher salary. But the woman of the house often tortured me.” Now, Bhumij is back to plucking tea leaves, which pays minimal wages, amidst climatic uncertainties.
