Philip Gain

The government has a huge task ahead in terms of making its social security programmes effective.

Tea workers may not have had their demands fulfilled, but their united voice brings in a new era of workers' rights.

In the best interests of the tea sector, tea garden owners and government functionaries should promote true trade unionism.

It is the responsibility of the government to ensure justice and protection for tea workers

Bangladesh is amazingly green. Yet, historically, our natural forests have always been limited. In 2000, the Bangladesh Bureau of Statistics estimated our total forest area to be 2.6 million hectares.

A beautiful baid may soon turn into a little artificial lake in Modhupur forest area. Baid is low land to grow rice and other crops in, between chala (high) land with sal stands.

It was midday on October 6, 2018. A woman was sitting under a mahogany tree at Sreemangal Upazila Health Complex in Moulvibazar. Another woman was holding a newborn wrapped in a blanket.

An unthinkable and deplorable situation has risen out of the rigid position taken by the Minimum Wage Board (MWB) that was formed to fix the minimum wage for the hapless tea workers of Bangladesh.

Paban Paul, 38, a tea worker of Rampur Tea Garden in Bahubal upazila (Habiganj district), died of Covid-19 on July 6. Rampur Tea Garden is a furi (division) of Rashidpur Tea Estate, owned by Finlay Tea Co. Ltd.

The Minimum Wage Board (MWB), formed in October 2019, declared a draft wage structure for tea garden workers through a gazette notice published on June 13, 2021.

Once a pure jungle, Modhupur sal forest is now, for the most part, a motley assortment of vast banana, pineapple and spice orchards.

Ratan Shadhu (56), a tea worker from Doloi Tea Garden in Moulvibazar district, earns a daily cash wage of Tk 102 (USD 1.2).

The indigenous communities of the plains of Bangladesh, including those in the tea gardens, are excluded and marginalised for their identity, occupations, casteism, culture, geographical locations, and various other reasons.

The tea plantation workers (TPWs) in some 60 tea gardens in Sylhet stopped work for a day or two in the beginning of the countrywide lockdown.

The coronavirus has affected us all—rich and poor alike. Yet, giving attention and care to communities considered excluded, marginalised and invisible should be a priority for the state and well-to-dos.

The tea workers of Shamshernagar Tea Garden in Kamalganj upazila, Moulvibazar, took matters into their own hands in defiance of the garden management and stopped work from March 27.

Purna Chisik and Satendra Nokrek have four daughters—Francila, Malita, Nomita and Malina—and two sons—Parmel and Sebastin.

14 Bede families have set up their oval-shaped makeshift tents on private land in Natun Torki, a village in Kalkini Upazila of Madaripur district. A branch of the Arialkha river flows on the west of Natun Torki. The area is well-known in Barishal for Torki Bandar, a narrow but flowing river on the west. The Bede huts are just on the outskirts of the crowded Natun Torki market.

We stand in the middle of Rohingya Camp No. 18. It is in the southwest of Kutupalong Rohingya camp cluster in Ukhia upazila of Cox's Bazar district. We are stunned.

Election of Bangladesh Cha Sramik Union (BCSU) on June 24 was a joyous occasion for tea workers. BCSU happens to be the largest trade union in Bangladesh. And it is the only union for the 97,646 voters who are all registered workers in 161 tea gardens in Sylhet, Maulvibazar, Habiganj, Chattogram and Rangamati Hill District. The recent election was the third time since 1948 that the impoverished tea workers had voted for their leaders.