The Hindu : Business : Tata Tea's exit worries planters

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Friday, Apr 08, 2005

Business

Business

Tata Tea's exit worries planters

By G. Satyamurty

COIMBATORE, APRIL 7. Tata Tea's exit from Kerala plantations this month has alarmed the tea industry. "It is not for the fact of their exit, but for the reasons which prompted the exit," laments C. Sankaranarayanan, Adviser, Planters Association of Tamil Nadu.

Talking to The Hindu, he said "The company is due to exit from its Tamil Nadu plantations also, though it may be under a different scheme." According to him, industrial sickness is manifested in different ways — continuous losses, accumulation of liabilities, including unpaid wages and provident fund. Terminal sickness results in closure, stopping of operations and abandonment of the industrial unit. "But, an organisation with a good business sense and an image and reputation to safeguard would evaluate in time the long term prospects of its enterprise and take the exit route before it is too late and before it gets a bad name."

"The hope behind this novel venture must be that the employees being responsible for the profitable running of their venture, will put in better productivity-linked performance." The circumstances that forced a company such as Tata Tea to exit from its plantations should equally worry the trade unions and the planters' associations.

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