Cooch Behar, Nov 17: The delay in issuing no-objection certificates" (NoCs) by the land & land reforms department (L&LR department) of the West Bengal government to the owners of big tea gardens has created a new class in the tea industry called small tea-cultivators in the districts of North Bengal.Several hundred small tea-cultivators have started producing tea leaves in their gardens on the strength of NoCs issued liberally by the L&LR department offices in the districts concerned.
The Cooch Behar district magistrate, Indevar Pandey, told The Financial Express that state government has told the L&LR department to issue NOCs to small cultivators without delay.
When asked about the fate of big tea garden owners who had applied for NOCs during the 90's, Pandey said the detailed survey of land schedule submitted by the big tea-cultivators is yet to be completed.
An official of the L&LR department, Cooch Behar said big cultivators have been classified by the government as having over 24.20 acres and small cultivators are those who have land measuring below 24 acres.
He also said the owners of big tea gardens who had applied for NOCs during 1990-94 in Cooch Behar district were: Sublime Agro (P) Ltd, Longview Tea Co Ltd, Washabarie Tea Company, Durgmeswari Planters (P) Ltd, Cooch Behar Agro Tea, Doolong Tea Estate and Mou Priya Planters (P) Ltd.
The joint secretary of the L&LR department in a circular No 2025 (8) L dated August 24, 1999 and issued to the district magistrates of North Bengal said: "A number of new tea gardens have recently come up in the districts of Uttar Dinajpur, Darjeeling, Jalpaiguri and Cooch Behar. It appears that in many cases they have been deviating from the guidelines issued by the department on June 11, 1990 and September 27, 1993 regarding the establishment of new tea gardens."
An official source said tha small cultivators are the creation of a section of big tea garden owners whose NOCs have not been issued as yet.
He also said a section of big tea garden owners in North Bengal have purchased fallow land from small cultivators in Uttar Dinajpur, Darjeeling, Jalpaiguri and Cooch Behar at throwaway prices and started producing tea leaves without paying any cess to the state government.
An agriculture income tax officer who is posted in Cooch Behar said most of the big tea garden owners do not maintain any office at their sites and instead manage their gardens from their head offices in Calcutta.
One of the owners produced 1,97,791 kg and 2,87,882 kg tea leaves in 1996-97 and 1997-98 respectively.
Copyright © 1999 Indian Express Newspapers (Bombay) Ltd.