Dispur betrays Tea Tribes: MLA Rupjyoti Kurmi

GUWAHATI: Congress MLA from Mariani Rupjyoti Kurmi has said that the BJP-led coalition government at Dispur has betrayed the Tea Tribe by not doing anything tangible for the wellbeing of the community.

Talking to the media in Guwahati on Friday, Kurmi said: “The BJP-led government at Dispur has not done anything for the wellbeing of Tea Tribes. Even as the tea community has three MLAs and two MPs in the State, the BJP government has made only one of them the Minister of State. The BJP-led government at the Centre, on the other hand, hasn’t accommodated the tea community in its ministry.”

On the sops for the tea community announced recently by Dispur, Kurmi said: “The sops are nothing but poll gimmick to garner votes of the community. It has announced for providing smart phones to labour line sardars. However, the ground reality in the State is such that even rickshaw pullers have such smart phones in the State.”

On Dispur’s promise for extending GNM and ANM nurse training for tea garden girls, Kurmi said: “Such training has been stalled for two years in the State. How come Dispur provide such trainings as promised?”

Kurmi said that despite making the promise to accord ST status to six ethnic communities, including Tea Tribes, the BJP-led government hasn’t fulfilled the promise. “This is not all. State Government has pushed the issue of appointing teachers in schools in tea gardens to the back burner. The students in such schools have no textbooks,” he said.

Meanwhile, the MLA came down heavily on the All Assam Tea Tribe Students’ Association (AATTSA) for, what he said, working at the behest of the BJP. “The students’ body hasn’t been holding its general conference for seven years,” he said.