Tea garden workers in Sylhet began returning to work Sunday, ending 19 days of strike after Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina stepped in to increase their daily wages to Tk 170 to 120.
The new date was announced on Saturday night after the prime minister’s meeting with the tea estate owners to discuss the workers’ demand to raise their daily pay to Tk 300.
Though most of the tea gardens were closed due to the weekly holiday, workers of a number of tea gardens were seen joining their work in the morning. Workers will join full-fledged from Monday, this correspondent found.
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Many of the workers expressed their gratitude to PM Sheikh Hasina for her intervention.
Dulal Hazra, a worker at the tea plantation in Bharaura, said that they have accepted the decision taken by the PM.
“We will start work. Although it will be hard to go by with only Tk 170 per day, we will return to work as the PM has urged,” he said.
Bangladesh Tea Workers’ Union Organising Secretary Bijoy Hazra said that as they vowed to accept the decision of the PM, therefore they started work from Sunday after the PM set their wage at Tk 170.
Finley Tea Company General Manager and Bangladesh Tea Association Sylhet Division Chairman Golam Mohammad Shibli also confirmed that all the workers of the Finley tea garden have joined work.
PM Hasina’s intervention in persuading the owners to hike the daily wages to Tk 170 seems to have been welcomed by the workers who started their agitation on August 8. Over 125,000 workers across 167 tea plantations across the country at one stage went on an indefinite strike to press for their demand.
Prime Minister’s Principal Secretary Ahmed Kaikaus said that the daily wages for the tea workers have been set by the prime minister on behalf of the workers after a meeting held with the tea garden owners at her official residence Ganabhaban.
Apart from this, the other facilities for the workers will be increased proportionately.
