Gauhati High Court clears Assam’s move to grant land rights to tea workers

Gauhati High Court has allowed the Assam government to proceed with its decision to grant land ownership rights to tea garden workers, declining to stay an amended law challenged by the Indian Tea Association (ITA).

The matter was heard on February 4, when counsel for both the ITA and the state government presented arguments on the amendment passed during the winter session of the Assam Assembly.

Advocate General Devajit Saikia said the ITA opposed the amendment on the ground that it would “change the structure of the tea gardens”. The planters’ body also contended that the move could hamper tea production and disrupt the functioning of the estates.

The high court did not grant a stay on the legislation. According to Saikia, the court observed that the initiative falls within the state’s welfare framework and permitted the government to continue with the process. Workers residing in labour lines within tea estates will be granted ownership rights on payment of Rs 500 per bigha.

Saikia said Assam has around 850 tea estates, with labour lines in 707 of them. “Generations of workers have lived in these lines with no rights over their land. The Assam government started the process of granting land rights to them and ownership will be transferred to the workers living in the labour lines inside the tea gardens,” he said.

The state cabinet had earlier approved the policy decision, following which the Assembly passed the Assam Fixation of Ceiling of Land Holdings (Amendment) Act, 2025, enabling distribution of land in labour lines for housing ownership.

Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma described the amendment as an attempt to correct a “historic mistake” by granting land rights to workers who have been “toiling in tea gardens for the last 200 years”, after being brought to Assam during the colonial period.