The Trinamul Congress has started fresh initiatives to woo people living in the tea gardens of the Dooars as panchayats polls are round the corner.

The ruling party had performed miserably in the Dooars in the general election of 2019 and the Assembly polls of 2021.

Trinamul, along with its labour wing INTTUC, has drawn up a new plan to reach out to tea plantation workers and their families in each garden and apprise them of the Mamata Banerjee government’s initiatives for their socio-economic development since 2011.

“There is no reason why tea estate workers shouldn’t stand by us..... Mamata Banerjee has done a lot for them and even launched the first-of-its-kind housing scheme for the workers. But what we have found is that most of these people do not have any inkling of these initiatives. Even if they are getting benefits of the state-run social welfare schemes, they have no idea who has mooted the schemes for them,” said Prakash Chik Baraik, the Alipurduar district Trinamul president.

In Alipurduar, which is one of the tea-producing districts of the state, the BJP has managed to march ahead of Trinamul — much like in Darjeeling and Jalpaiguri (two other tea-producing districts of Bengal) in the elections. In 2019, the BJP had won all these three Lok Sabha seats and in 2021 also, most of the Assembly seats went to the party.

In Alipurduar and Darjeeling, Trinamul could not win a single Assembly seat despite its overwhelming performance in other parts of the state.

Such contrasting performance in the tea belt had left state Trinamul leaders peeved with their colleagues in the districts.

Recently, a number of office-bearers were changed and new faces, including youths from tea estates, have been brought to the forefront of the party.

“There is a specific instruction from the state leaders that no stone should be left unturned to boost our support base in tea estates. As a part of the plan, we are conducting block-level workshops where four-five youths from each tea garden are invited,” Baraik said.

On Sunday and Monday, a two-day workshop of Kumargram block was held at a private resort in Rajabhatkhawa, located on the outskirts of Alipurduar town. Representatives from all 12 tea estates of the block were present at the workshop.

“We are explaining to them the social welfare schemes run by the state, especially for the tea workers. They are being told about details of the schemes and how these are benefiting thousands of people. The participants, in turn, will reach out to the people in their areas. The initiative, we believe, can help the residents understand the schemes better,” said a senior Trinamul leader.