“Will the Govt. shift Tea Board headquarters from Kolkata to Guwahati” Silchar MP Rajdeep Roy in parliament

Member of Parliament, Silchar, Dr. Rajdeep Roy who has been actively attending the Lok Sabha sessions has yet again posed a question during the question hour today. Speaking about the tea industries of Assam he questioned the house through the Speaker of the Lok Sabha.

His question was, “Whether the Government of India has any plan of shifting the Tea Board Head Quarters from Kolkata to Guwahati as it is the centre of activities?”

Speaking about this issue, the MP said, “Assam accounts for 70% of the tea production of India and is also the epicentre of tea trade in the country”.

His question to the Ministry of Commerce was, why isn’t the government planning to shift the headquarters of the Tea Board from Kolkata to Guwahati, as it is the major tea production belt.

Posting a video clip of the question hour, he took to social media and wrote, “Voiced the demand of shifting the #TeaBoard HQ and office of TEA COMPANIES from #Kolkata to #Guwahati as Assam happens to produce 70% of the Tea since ages and is home to most of the Tea Estates of the country”. The member further wrote, “Interestingly the Tea hub of West Bengal – the North Bengal distts (districts) are also geographically and infrastructure wise nearer to Guwahati then Kolkata. Keeping in line of the Act-East and inclusive policy of the GoI (Government of India), it is more important to do away with the Imperial traditions and shift these offices to the North East”.

Tea Board of India is a statutory body, set up on 1st April 1954 as per Section (4) of the Tea Act, 1953. As an apex body, it looks after the overall development of the tea industry. The Board’s Head Office is situated in Kolkata and there are two Zonal offices-one each in North Eastern Region at Jorhat in Assam and in Southern Region at Coonoor in Tamil Nadu. According to the last annual data (2020-2021) published by the Tea Board of India, Assam accounts for the highest tea producing state in India followed by West Bengal. The total area under tea cultivation in Assam is accounting for more than half of the country’s total area under tea. Assam alone produces more than half of India’s tea production. The estimated annual average production of tea in Assam is about 630- 700 million kilograms. Setting up of Tea Board’s headquarter in Guwahati would help develop the tea estates and further increase the productivity of the present industries.