DIBRUGARH, May 2 ? India?s leading tea buyer and manufacturer, Hindustan Lever has begun to react to the unprecedented gloom in the tea industry. At least eight of the company?s senior most managers at the Doom Dooma India estates have been shown the door with a golden handshake. Panicky executives of the company are tight lipped over the matter, lest they too come in the line of fire. All the senior managers who were made to go into retirement were to retire by December 2004 or earlier. These senior tea planters do not have much to complain, as they are anyway receiving their normal retiring benefits. Hindustan Lever?s chief executive officer of the tea division, Satish Dhall flew down to Doom Dooma earlier this week to personally see to it that the senior managers do not walk out in a huff.
Meanwhile, not less than 90 per cent members of the Assam Chah Karmachari Sangha (ACKS) have refused to accept their salaries of April this year, as the payments did not include the 8 per cent variable dearness allowance and the annual increments. Both the payments are usually made out along with the salary amount in April/May. This year the VDA and the increments have been paid by the ?native gardens?, but not yet by the bigger tea companies. Their plea is that with low tea price realisations, additional expenses are either being curtailed or witheld. The ACKS central office here has asked all its 20 branches throughout the State to take appropriate action on the matter on their own. As such, a major section of the ACKS? 13,400 members have refused to accept their salaries without the annual increments and VDA.
Asked to comment on the premature retirement of several senior tea managers in Upper Assam the Hindustan Lever head office in Mumbai termed the developments as ?an ongoing process for ensuring operation efficiency?. The company?s corporate communications general manager said that as a result of ?these changes? (premature retirements), ?the management cost as a percentage of our turnover will not go down?. He added : ?by improving operational efficiency the overall welfare of the managers and employees of Doom Dooma Indian Division is aimed to be enhanced?. While these may be brave words from a public relations officer, the fact remains that following the forced retirements, none the local of junior managers got any promotion. Instead, estate managers from the company?s south India plantations are gradually being inducted into the upper Assam estates. Eventually, local employment avenues would thus be sealed.
The reader will recall that several eminent tea planters made no bones about their apprehension that Hindustan Lever, by entering the tea scenario in Assam, has a game plan. The company?s tea buying arm, Brook Bond Lipton has already shown how it can armtwist tea auction centres, especially the Guwahati Tea Auction Centre. Many believe that it was Brook Bond Lipton which was singularly instrumental in pulling down tea prices at the Guwahati Tea Auction Centre. As auction prices of tea plummetted to ridiculous levels, the end consumer did not reap the benefits of this lower price. Instead, tea prices for the end consumer remained the same, with the auction buyers laughing all the way to the banks.
So this is how Hindustan Lever is out to make hay while the sun shines. The company hires and fires at will and contributes to creating a situation where its activity would go unchecked. The more important worry for tea planters in the State is that if the company?s various divisions continue to hold sway, the other bigger tea companies too would receive encouragement to take similar steps. And with senior tea managers too gentle to speak out, there would be no one to espouse their cause. They would continue to be browbeaten with none to even raise a whimper of a protest, says a prominent tea planter here. With planters hoping against hope for better days to return, the developments at Hindustan Lever have come as yet another jolt. And this is not going to serve the wider interests of the industry in Assam. For, next in the voluntary retirement scheme could be the junior managers, followed by the office staff and then the important segment of the tea labourers. One just hopes things do not ?develop? to this extent.