Mr Dinesh Kumar Sharma, President, All-Assam Small Tea Growers’ Association, has been elected Vice-Chairman of Tea Board for 2012-13. At a meeting held at Kochi on Friday, members of the board decided to elect Mr Sharma as the Vice-Chairman. This is for the first time, small tea growers will have representation on the apex decision-making body of Tea Board.

The post of Vice-Chairman of Tea Board, which is one-year term, is held by the representative of tea industry by rotation – one year by the Chairman of Indian Tea Association (ITA) representing North Indian tea interest and the next year by the President of Upasi representing the South Indian interest.

The Upasi President held the position for 2011-12 and his term having come to end , the Chairman of ITA was due to take over for 2012-13. However, that did not happen. The Chairman of ITA did not attend Friday’s meeting.

In his absence, the members present decided to elect Mr Sharma as the Vice-Chairman.

Mr C.S. Bedi, Chairman of ITA, when contacted, declined to comment. “I’ve nothing to say”, he said adding, “I’ve no knowledge of what happened at today’s board meeting.”.

A spokesman for ITA, however, suspected if proper procedure had been followed in regard to the election of the Tea Board Vice-Chairman for 2012-13. Normally, the issue of election of Vice-Chairman would be discussed, though a formality, at the last board meeting of every financial year. But this time it was not discussed at the March 2 meeting which was the last board meeting of 2011-12, though the ITA Chairman attended that meeting and all industry members present were reportedly in favour of his election as the Vice-Chairman.

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