Dealing With Discordant Notes!

To deal with demonetisation, people along the Bengal border are using currency from Nepal and Bhutan.

- Rabi Banerjee

A tribe of monkeys guarded the path leading to the Trihana Tea Garden in north Bengal, about 20km from the India-Nepal border. As we approached, they reluctantly gave way and allowed us to reach the closed gate. A gentle knock elicited a response from the other side. “The garden is closed, no need to come,” said a middle-aged man. As we persisted, he let us in. The once famous tea garden looked deserted and a lonely notice board displayed a bunch of letters from the manager. The latest one read: “Due to demonetisation, we are unable to help workers and plucking will be closed for an indefinite period.”

“Only I have been asked to stand at the gate and will be paid for it,” said the gatekeeper, Mohan Roy. “All of my colleagues [about 450] have lost their daily earnings from December 12.”

Another notice, dated December 3, instructed the employees to open bank accounts under the Union government’s Jan Dhan scheme, to minimise cash transaction and avoid disruption of payment.

But, it was apparently too late for the workers to do so and, in dire need of money, they protested outside the manager’s office on December 8. Under mounting pressure, the garden was shut down.

About half a dozen other tea gardens have also shut down as the owners couldn’t pay cash to the workers. “Yes, the gardens are closed,” said Rabindranath Ghosh, minister of north Bengal development. “We could do little. The entire country is facing problems because of such a policy. What could we do?”

While the tea gardens in north Bengal face the brunt of demonetisation, thousands of villagers along the Indian border in the state have created their own economic rules. They have started using currency from Nepal and Bhutan, along with the Indian rupee, for daily transactions.