Two corporate bidders will divide holdings of the West Bengal Tea Development Corp. that include 1700 acres (679 hectares) of Darjeeling tea gardens among 2,600 acres in five estates.
The government invited bids last year after the corporation defaulted for six month on INRs 300,000 in gratuity payments due 4,211 workers. The West Bengal Tea Development Corp. also failed to provide food rations, firewood and is in arrears on payments for other goods and services, according to news accounts in the The Hindu.
Ambootia Group bid for control of three gardens in Darjeeling and Malnady Tea Private Ltd. is likely to be awarded two estates in the Dooars region of North Bengal, according to documents from the Mamata Banerjee Government in Kolkata.
The gardens produced a combined 900,000 kilos of tea in 2006, a yield that has since fallen to 700,000 kilos. The gardens continue to produce good tea but sources told the newspaper the “absence of critical inputs… and lack of marketing skills (especially in overseas markets) had spelt doom for these state-owned gardens, which were languishing for nearly a decade.”
Privatization of tea lands is a gradual process. Most of the 87 gardens are leased for 50 to 99 years. Five companies bid for the gardens in a process monitored by KPMG. Formal acceptance is expected shortly. The amount of the winning bids was not disclosed.