MANY TONGUES, ONE PEOPLE: CONSTRUCTING THE ‘TEA – TRIBE’
3.6. Coolie Labour in Local Landscape: Tea Tribe and the local population
interests. However, it is the tea tribe identity rather than that of Adivasi identity that plays the decisive role in shaping the voting preferences of tea workers, and the proponents of Adivasi consciousness would rarely engage in malicious activities towards a non-Adivasi tea tribe candidate.
p. 1312). Assamese and Kachari peasants, despite being disliked by the colonial planters, they continued to be engaged for specific, temporary tasks on tea plantations, even at the height of indentured labour (Ramsden, 1944 cited in Sharma, 2008). Such work was helpful for the local peasantry in meeting urgent cash demand. However, such an interaction hardened social prejudice against tea work and that migrant population which depended on it for a living.
It was the caste Hindu Assamese and Bengali Mohurirs (clerks) who for a long time were the only locals who had sustained face-to-face interactions with these migrant labourers. In the neighbourhood school, teachers lamented that pupils left for plantation appointments once they had reached the higher classes. While a plantation clerkship provided a valuable income to the rural gentry even though it was less prestigious and paid less than an equivalent government position. Jobs for the local population ranged from the hurra mohurir (head clerk) who wrote letters and kept accounts, the hazrah mohurir (paymaster clerk) who oversaw coolies at work and in the evening, gave them their hazrahs (pay), to the godown mohurir (storeroom clerk) who allotted new materials and tools, and weighed picked leaves. There were also ‘Doctor Babus’ who were to treat large numbers of labourers with little equipment. They were native medical licentiates who treated the labourers and formed another segment of this supervisory class.
New planters were made aware that differences in social standing exist between these Assamese and Bengali caste Hindu employees and their subordinate coolies.
On their arrival on the plantations, any new employee was warned that these ‘Garden Babus’ formed the middle classes of local society.
In the contemporary period, some basic inferences can be made on the social relations between the tea garden workers and the surrounding peasant population. The
social composition of the population around the gardens is varied and differs from zone to zone within the valley. In the Upper Assam areas on the south bank extending from Nagaon to Tinsukia districts, most of the gardens are surrounded by the Assamese population, including tribals and ex-tea garden workers who identify themselves as Assamese. Castes like Ahom, Motok and Moran constitute a majority of the Assamese population in the easternmost districts of the valley. The Mishing tribe predominates in Dhemaji and Lakhimpur districts, and the Bodo tribe in the northern areas of undivided Darrang, Kamrup and Goalpara districts, where many gardens are located. On the North Bank, a sizeable Nepali population is found in the tea areas of the undivided Lakhimpur and Darrang districts. In all the tea areas, substantial Bengalis and Hindi speaking people, including Marwaris and Biharis, are found, many of whom are linked by trade or profession to the gardens (Das, 2011). In Assam, the names of tribes such as Santhal, Oraon, Munda or Kharia are understood in local parlance to the tea worker community.
The growth of the ex-tea garden worker society in the vicinity of the tea gardens has made the process of integration of the tea workers into the local society easier.
The settlements were initially homogeneous in composition, consisting of ex-tea labourers only. Interaction between them and the local people has developed very slowly. It is confined mainly to the economic and political spheres: “The socio-cultural interactions of this segment of the population with the local Assamese population were restricted in the initial period. Nevertheless, it has gradually developed, and the overall relationship is cordial.
However, some degree of aloofness from the Assamese society is apparent” (Goswami, 1984, p. 6).
“Our community has always maintained a distance from the outside world. That is how we were kept. There was very little interaction with the local population”.
“Most people outside the Garden very much misunderstand us. We are seen as a very backward and uncivilised community.”
“Many of our people these days work as domestic help in nearby villages. This has improved the relationship, but we are still looked down”.
“Our people are mostly uneducated, which hampers the relationship with the outside world.
Due to occurrence of incidents like witch-hunting and attack on staffs have all bought a bad name to us.”
“Most of our people nowadays work outside the garden, but we are still seen as ‘baganiya’
made to work at the Garden only.”
-Perception on Communal Relations from FGDs (translated from Assamese)
The ex-tea worker community occupies a position in the lower rung in the social ladder of the local people. The prolonged isolation of the group, initially maintained by the British planters and subsequently perpetuated by the local people, has contributed substantially to the tea labourers' observed minimum cultural borrowings. Phukan considers the tea garden labour society as a sister society of the ex-tea garden labour population:
The present population in the ex-tea garden labour villages had their origin in the tea estates, most usually in the neighbouring tea estates. The existing wage-earning society in the tea estates and the newly developed society in the ex-tea garden labour villages have essential characteristics (Phukan, 1984, p. 115).
There is little scope for conflict of interest between the tea and the ex- tea garden labour. However, there is competition between the two groups mainly for two scarce resources, land and employment. These areas of conflict are likely to grow in future.
While permanent employment in the gardens has become quite restricted, opportunities for temporary work during the plucking season are plentiful. The gardens prefer to employ surplus labour from their resident population and hire ex-tea workers for any additional labour requirements. The poorer sections of ex-tea workers are found to envy the tea workers whose economic position has enhanced a lot since the old days18. The garden
18 Personal interview with Ramji Lohar, 30 March 2019.
workers are· also allotted cultivable land, and inside the Garden, they can raise paddy. So far as ownership or hiring of land outside the gardens is concerned, the ex-tea workers are in a better position than the tea workers. The Government has allotted some ceiling-surplus lands to the ex-tea labour population. However, such land has become very scarce, resulting in high landlessness and unemployment among the ex-tea garden worker population.
There is an unequal relationship between the tea worker population and the Assamese society. It is observed that the average Assamese peasant traditionally considered the tea garden worker population as a single social group (or caste) of the lowest order. The relatively affluent local peasants, owing to land ownership, looked down upon the plantation labourers who lived under slave-like conditions. The local peasantry believed them to be of an inferior race. The ex- tea garden workers, too, carried the same stigma, even though they no longer lived within the confines of the plantation system. The segregation between them and the Assamese population has been accentuated by the economic and educational backwardness of the tea worker population. It has widened the social distance between the two communities. The divide has also been enforced as a result of caste notions inhibiting social interaction. Relations between tea workers and non- Assamese residents of the tea areas are primarily based on economic ties, and social interaction is limited and personalised.
Various individuals and organisations have been making conscious efforts to assimilate the tea labour population and their culture into the mainstream Assamese society. The apex organisation for the promotion of Assamese language, literature and culture, the Assam Sahitya Sabha, has recognised the culture of the tea workers as part of Assamese culture:
It is implicit that the tea garden labour population is not yet integrated into the socio-cultural life of Assam. Integrating them into the greater society means recognition of the culture of the tea garden labour class as part of the Assamese culture (Phukan, 1987, p. 121).
In recent years, the tea workers are seen to have picked up the cultural traits of Assamese culture. However, the transmission process has been very slow and somewhat confined to the central and eastern parts of the valley. The cultural assimilation of the plantation workers has also been facilitated by the flexible and accommodative attitude shown by the dominant section of the Assamese population. Commenting on the scope of social relationships between the plantation workers and the local population, Bhuyan states that:
Socio-cultural assimilation as it appears today may be prolonged because matrimonial relations between members of the indigenous community and those of the tea labour immigrants have not yet been established. This is partly because their social status regarding caste and creed is yet to be considered at par with that of the indigenous society.
Last but not least, there are visible physical differences born out of their different racial background, preventing usual matrimonial alliances between the two communities (Bhuyan, 1994, p. 219).
In art and literature, members of the tea worker community have contributed numerous Assamese literary works, including prose, poetry, song and drama. The mouthpiece of the Asam Chah-Mazdoor Janajati Chatra Santha (now ATTSA) entitled Seujipaat, ACMS’s Chah-Mazdoor, the All Assam Chah-Shramik Sangh’s Smaronika (souvenir), and the monthly journal Madol (now defunct) edited by Ganesh Kurmi have made valuable contributions towards popularising Assamese language and literature among the tea workers and gave rise to a new genre of Assamese litterateurs among them (Das, 2011). Special issues and supplements have been published in many Assamese journals and newspapers. Such write-ups have highlighted the literary and cultural aspects of the tea
worker community. Saptahik Nilachal, the well-known weekly magazine of the seventies, published special issues focussed on tea- tribes on 26 August 1970 and 2 July 1980, about various aspects of the community. Another popular Assamese weekly, Xonor Asam (Golden Assam), brought out a unique tea tribes’ issue in 1975 (Das, 2011). Special programmes for tea workers are relayed by the Dibrugarh and Guwahati centres of All India Radio (AIR) and Guwahati Doordarshan. Assamese films like Chameli Memsahab, directed by Dr Bhupen Hazarika, is woven around life at the plantation. Besides, movies like Kachghar Rangdhali, Kecha Son, and Ratanlal (the ACMS produced the last two) have faithfully portrayed tea garden life and brought many hidden artists from the tea community.
An exciting aspect amongst the Tea-Tribe/caste is their propensity to identify with an influential group within the community. For instance, among the tea workers, those with the title Tanti occupy positions of influence and high offices, such as Minister in the State and member of Legislative Assembly and art and literature. Tanti is the title of the weaver caste in parts of eastern India (mostly Odisa). The Tanti of the ex-tea worker community has been able to mix in the Assamese society through inter-ethnic marriages. By adopting this title, many tea workers identify with this group which is well-known outside the gardens. The practice of adopting the Tanti title and then Assamese ethnic identity marks a process of upward mobility among the tea and ex-tea worker community. Jain observes that through the medium of their Tanti caste title, the tea workers have tried to break the barriers between them and their Assamese neighbours:
Having ·gained access to the trade union and labour movement in Assam.
Thus, getting a Tanti minister for labour in the state government of Assam, the tea garden workers have been able to assert an image of respectability (Jain, 1992, p. 36).
Such desire for upward mobility can also be observed in the case of some other sections of workers, such as the Kurmis. The Kurmis for long have identified
themselves as Rajputs (a warrior caste of North India) and claimed higher status in the caste hierarchy (Kurmi, 1969). Although, such an attempt found little footing in the community as it lacked any long-drawn effort to implement the idea of belonging to a higher caste.
Regarding the notion of upward mobility amongst the tea tribe community, Phukan notes, The Sanskritization process has not much relevance to the tea worker society as it meant only certain positional changes within their castes and tribal situations, and they could not enter the social structure of the local Assamese population’ (Phukan, 1987, p. 109).
While in their areas of origin, most of these workers would have been considered Scheduled Tribes or Scheduled Castes. In Assam, they are considered as Other Backward Castes, along with indigenous castes like Ahom and Koch-Rajbonshi. However, it is observed that socially the members of the OBC communities in the Assamese society tend to look down upon the tea garden worker population, considering them as belonging to lower castes.