West Bengal tea workers demand hike in wages

Siliguri, May 8 : Workers in tea estates in West Bengal's Siliguri District have demanded a hike in their wages, as they are lamenting over their pathetic lives.
The tea garden workers complained that the hopes of providing basic education to their children have remained a mirage due to pittance of wages paid to them.
"We want that the wages of tea garden workers in the Terai region should be hiked. The wages that we get right now are not proper and we are not able to fulfill our daily needs with those wages," said Lal Krishna Toppo, a tea garden worker, on Saturday.
"We want that we should get proper wages so that we are able to get three meals a day and are also able to provide good education to our children," he added.

Aloke Chakraborty, Joint Secretary of National Union of Plantation Workers (NUPW), said the state government should declare minimum wages of tea garden workers to Rs. 165.
"We demand that the tea garden workers should get minimum wages of Rs. 165 and these wages should be declared by the state government," he added.
Chakraborty said that if their demands are not fulfilled they will continue with the protest and if needed, they may go on strike.
"We are demanding hike in wages from a long time and these should be given counted from April 1 and if they won't fulfill our demands then we will continue with our protest and if needed, we will also go on strike," he added.

There are around 1,00,000 tea workers in Siliguri, who are directly dependent on the industry.

--ANI