After Assam, Tripura is the second largest producer of tea in the northeastern region producing around 10 million kg of tea annually from an area of 6,885 hectares under tea cultivation. Tripura Tea Development Corporation Chairman Santosh Saha said that works in most of the 54 tea gardens and 15 of the 21 processing factories in Tripura have started since early this week after three weeks of shutdown due to country-wide lockdown.

“With late start of plucking and subsequent processing, the production and productivity in the tea industry in Tripura would be less this year. After the ensuing rains, plucking of green leaves would be useless. So, though late, this is the appropriate time to start the plucking,” Saha told IANS. Tripura Industries and Commerce Department Secretary G. K. Dinkarrao said that they received an order from the MHA (Ministry of Home Affairs) earlier this month to resume work in the tea gardens of the state with some preconditions—deploying a maximum of 50 per cent of the workforce, keeping social distance and hygiene and wearing masks.

About 20,000 people are directly employed in the 54 big gardens in Tripura, with another 15,000 people involved in 230 small gardens, contributing immensely to the growth of the state’s overall economy.