Darjeeling Information

The dawn of Darjeeling Tea industry happened by holding the hands of Dr. Campbell, who brought China tea seeds from Kumeon and planted it near his residence in his garden at Beachwood, Darjeeling, which was 2000 m above sea level. Later the favorable physical conditions of Darjeeling prompted the British raj to set up several tea estates in that area. In due course, various trials are executed by Government to plant and grow tea in the low altitudes and in most cases proved successful. By 1852 several advanced stages of plantations are accomplished in both of Assam . During this time several China plants were also found in the Kurseong and Pankhabari areas.

The first commercial tea estate in Darjeeling were Tukvar, Steinthal and Aloobari tea estates. Established in 1852, all the seeds were grown in the Government nurseries. After 1856, the progress of commercial tea estates was rapid.

The reports provided by Darjeeling Gazetteer shows that, Alubari Tea Garden was opened by the Kurseong and Darjeeling Tea Company and another estate in Lebong was opened by the Darjeeling Land Mortgage Bank. Several hundred acres of forestland was cleared, from 750 m to 1800 m elevated from the mean sea level. By 1857, Darjeeling had 30 tea estates, six nurseries, in which a ton of seed was grown and sown.

Later Government exported 725 kg of tea to the native areas, where the Tibetan tea was mostly popular. The Tibetan tea was coarse, harsh and black and arrived in a block of bricks. However, the flavored and light Darjeeling tea attracted everyone’s appetite for tea within a very short spell. Soon Darjeeling tea became the popular in native as well as in the distant counties. During the British Government, a large amount of tea was exported in their homeland.

However, the major challenge faced by Dr. Campbell, while setting up tea industry was to attract settlers to this unpopulated area. In the meantime, a gentleman from Nepal called Sri Dakman Rai came to Darjeeling with a large chunk of immigrants from Nepal. Later Rai, was awarded with ownership of some freehold lands presently known as Saurene, Phuguri and Samripani. In due course Dr. Campbell recruited more labors from the neighboring areas.

By 1870, almost all the estates started constructing the tea processing firms of their own.

Presently, the tea manufacturing involves a series of processing options. After picking up the leaves, it is withered in bamboo racks. Later the rolling was done manually and drying was done in a very crude way in big cauldrons. After that sorting was done by hand in winnowing fans and finally packing was done in boxes of local planks.

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