The tea estates in Tirunelveli District, Ambasamudram Circle, Western Ghats were leased for 99 years by Bombay Burma Trading Corporation, a private company in 1929. The company decided to lay off the tea plantation workers before the lease expires in 2028.
Also, the private tea plantation company was involved in the process of forcibly evicting the workers working there. It also sent a notice to the workers to vacate the Mancholai tea estate before August 7.
Political parties and social activists protested against the forced eviction of people who have been working in the Mancholai tea plantation for 3-4 generations.
A case was filed in the High Court Maduraiklai against a private company’s move to forcibly evict workers from the Mancholai tea estate. Maduraiklai High Court heard the case and said, ‘The private company should not take any action to evict the Mancholai tea plantation workers. It ordered that no action should be taken to evict anyone until rehabilitation facilities are provided to those workers.
Following this, the Bombay Burma Trading Corporation issued a notice to the Manjolai tea plantation workers not to vacate their homes temporarily.
Mancholai tea plantation workers, Tamil Nadu government, many people demanded that the government should accept and run the Mancholai tea plantation, just like how Dandee Company was started to provide livelihood for the Tamils who came from Sri Lanka.
However, the Tamil Nadu government said that they cannot accept Mancholai tea estate and merge it with Dawn Tea Company.
In this case, Muthuraman, a social activist from Palayangottai, had complained to the National Human Rights Commission on July 7 that the villagers of Mancholai were forcibly evicted.
In that petition, in the case of Mancholai tea plantation workers, Mancholai people should not be denied forest rights under the Forest Rights Act 2006 and Mancholai people are being evicted from there, which is a violation of human rights.
The National Human Rights Commission has registered a case based on this complaint. The case will be heard soon.
