Guwahati: Thousands of people from Assam’s tea garden community on Wednesday, marched through Tinsukia district to demand Scheduled Tribe (ST) designation once more.
A lot of people from all across the region came out to support the protest rally that the Assam Tea Tribe Students’ Association (ATTSA) and the All-Adivasi Students’ Association of Assam (AASAA) put on together. Protesters walked a long way to Thana Chariali in Tinsukia town, where they held signs and shouted slogans calling for justice for the tea tribe group.
The event happened at the same time as Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma’s official visit to the town. Protesters temporarily blocked roadways, saying that the government had not kept its commitments to give ST status to tea tribes and five other indigenous populations.
The tea garden population has been in Assam for more than 200 years. The British sent their forefathers from Jharkhand, Bihar, Chhattisgarh, Odisha, Madhya Pradesh, and West Bengal to work on tea estates in the area. They make up around a third of Assam’s population of over one crore people now, yet they still want recognition and rights.
The protesters wanted more than just ST status. They also wanted property ownership rights and higher daily income, alleging that the existing pay system doesn’t cover basic living needs.
The heads of the two groups said that the movement would get stronger if the government kept ignoring their requests.